The first portable toilet dates back to mid fourteenth century Egypt. Wooden portable toilets have been discovered in the tombs of important members of the community of Thebes. So our portable toilets today have a long and dignified history!

Until the eighteenth century, the portable chamber pot, was the most commonly used lavatory facility. City streets must have been very unpleasant, as people emptied their chamber pots by throwing the contents out of their windows. If you missed the warning cry, ‘look out below!’ you could be in for a nasty surprise!

It wasn’t until the first flushable toilet, developed by the Elizabethan poet Sir John Harington, that we had what we would now recognise as a portable toilet. Thomas Crapper significantly enhanced the invention in 1886. In the twentieth century, inventors combined the portability of the ancient lavatories with the sanitary benefits of the modern toilet. We now have a contained system that is also compact, lightweight, and transportable. So, next time you use one of Loo-Hire U.K.’s portable toilets, you are taking part in history!