Most people would rather not look too closely at public toilets.

But while this may be the sensible approach when navigating the kind of public facilities where fluorescent lights illuminate puddles of dubious provenance, some toilets are designed to draw the eye.

The City of Bayswater is hoping its “turtle toilet” could become a tourist destination after a $70,000 makeover.

“Around the world there are hundreds of imaginatively styled toilet blocks and we decided to make the one at Claughton Reserve more of a drawcard for the public,” Bayswater Mayor Dan Bull said. “We’re putting the reserve on the toilet tourism map with this art work.”

Toilet tourism is enough of a phenomenon that Lonely Planet produced a book about it, Toilets: A Spotter’s Guide. The My Travel Research website launched its inaugural toilet tourism awards last year.

Australian toilets highlighted by MyTravelResearch included a humble wooden shack with a spectacular view of Cobourg Marine Park in the Northern Territory,

International restrooms to make Lonely Planet’s cut included a bright green eco-toilet in the heart of Taylor Arm Provincial Park in British Columbia, a wooden box beside Norway’s Huldefossen Waterfall and Iceland’s alfresco toilet, which is not for the shy, given the absence of walls or even a bit of strategically placed shrubbery.