’90s bathroom decor nostalgia: With bath oil beads at Sportsgirl, let’s relive the other iconic bathroom accessories of the era

In alarming news for anyone who barely survived scrambling out of an oil-slicked bathtub back in the ’90s… bath beads are making a return.

Yes, the colourful, squishy, dissolvable bath oil pearls you’d find gathering dust on a saucer in every bathroom 30 years ago have made a quiet comeback.

Sportsgirl has been selling them for the past couple of years in a range of scents and shapes, namely hearts, ducks and balls. (Tragically, no dolphins, turtles or stars!)

Watch the video above.

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Naturally, those of us who are (ahem) old enough to remember the halcyon days of bath oil beads are feeling more than a little nostalgic.

“I remember trying to eat them when I was a kid,” one person commented on a video showcasing the product, while plenty of others remembered the hazards of the oil clinging to the tub post-soak.

“I remember trying to get out of the bath without falling down and knocking myself out,” one wrote, another saying, “I remember my mum being upset when she had to clean the bath.”

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While we reminisce on squeezing oil out of dolphin-shaped beads, let’s jump in a time machine and look back at the other bathroom homewares and accessories that reigned supreme in the ’90s.

Pot pourri

Is there a more ’90s image than pot pourri?

Long before reed diffusers took over as the room-perfuming accessory du jour, that role fell to pot pourri – the fancy French name for dried flower petals mixed with spices.

You’d usually find it in a dish sitting on a benchtop or bathtub edge, or in a drawer in a mesh bag, and almost always covered in a layer of dust because it was probably way too fiddly to bother cleaning.

Like scented candles these days, pot pourri was a go-to ‘I have no idea what to get this person’ gift, so even its biggest detractors likely ended up with some in their possession.

Nostalgic homewares and furniture that give us all the feels

Gel candles

The ocean was a popular theme in ’90s décor, and nobody was subtle about it.

Case in point: candles made of shells, starfish and other ocean motifs suspended in clear gel.

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You can still get these; they just don’t have the world in their clutches as much as they did three decades ago.

They were the height of bathroom sophistication, and every kid who grew up in the era fought an inevitable urge to stick their finger in it.

(And some brave soldiers actually let those intrusive thoughts win.)

Fancy soaps (that were never used)

Speaking of things gathering dust, no ’90s bathroom was complete without a selection of novelty soaps with no other purpose than to look nice.

Often these were shaped and scented like roses, and were often arranged with rolled-up towels in a dish for a dash of je ne sais quoi.

In many cases they were likely a well-meaning gift that seemed too nice to use, saved for a rainy day that never came.

When it came to actually washing hands, that responsibility fell to the classic bar of Imperial Leather soap (sticker intact, crucially).

A stack of magazines

The rise of the smartphone has spelled the death of an age-old bathroom décor staple: a stack or basket of magazines next to the toilet.

While these days we’re all about scrolling, in the ’90s you kept yourself occupied by flipping through a mag – which, somehow, was always Reader’s Digest.

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Anne Geddes or Pears soap prints

Given the love for minimalism that’s taken over décor in 2025, this one really feels like a past relic.

In the ’90s, it was common to see framed prints on the bathroom wall.

Popular options were Anne Geddes photos – particularly the one of babies in an old-school metal bathtub – or retro Pears Soap advertisements.

This video captures the aesthetic perfectly:

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