In article .com,
wrote:

Apparently neither you or the contractor you chose bothered to work out
a way of doing the work or work out an estimate of the cost.

You are certainly in a legal position to veto the method of providing
the new bath.
You are not, in my opinion, in a position to tell the contractor how to
do the job.

TB

I'm not sure I agree with all that. He told me, repeatedly, it wouldn't
be a problem to run pipes in the wall, now he doesn't want to do it. We
had an agreed upon line item for plumbing. By saying I didn't "bother"
you make me sound almost reckless, which I don't think is accurate.

Maybe I should have had that in writing. My first lesson, you can't
have too much in writing.

Regardless, I'm not really looking for legal advice, I'm more interested
in whether this is normal, running the pipes through a closet. And a
small closet at that.