Efficiently query product variants from inventory database (avoiding EAV) - mysql

Question

I'm building an ecommerce website for fun with three main components: frontend in Angular, MySQL database and a PHP backend that will function as a REST API.
The inventory database consists of products of which there are many variants (Yes, I've seen many questions on StackExchange discussing these kind of issues but I havent found a satisfying soultion yet). After reading several horror stories of using an EAV approach, Im avoiding that.
I think I have made a database solution that works, but Im uncertain to how I should query the data. As there are several many-to-many relationships a query for 1 product and all its variants can return several rows where only a couple columns contain "new" data.
(TL:DR) Main question: When querying a product for all its variants (colors, sizes of available colors and quantity of a color/size variant), what is most efficient:
Perform 1 database query returning many rows where I would need to build an associative array in PHP, discarding "duplicate" data?
Perform several queries when retrieving all variants of a product?
Or is there a flaw in the database design which is the cause of these issues?
Database schema:
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `products` (
`productID` INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
`name` VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
`longDescription` TEXT,
`shortDescription` VARCHAR(1000),
PRIMARY KEY (`productID`)
);
INSERT INTO `products` (`productID`, `name`, `longDescription`, `shortDescription`) VALUES
(1, 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt');
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `productpricing` (
`productID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`startDate` TIMESTAMP NOT NULL DEFAULT '1971-01-01 00:00:00',
`endDate` TIMESTAMP NOT NULL DEFAULT '2099-01-01 00:00:00',
`price` DECIMAL(10, 2) NOT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY(`productID`, `endDate`),
FOREIGN KEY (`productID`) REFERENCES products(`productID`)
);
INSERT INTO `productpricing` (`productID`, `startDate`, `endDate`, `price`) VALUES
(1, '1971-01-01 00:00:00', '2099-01-01 00:00:00', 309.99);
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `categories` (
`categoryID` INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
`categoryName` VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY (`categoryID`)
);
INSERT INTO `categories` (`categoryID`, `categoryName`) VALUES
(1, 'Test Category');
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `sizes` (
`sizeID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`size` INT NOT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY (`sizeID`)
);
INSERT INTO `sizes` (`sizeID`, `size`) VALUES
(1, 50),
(2, 56),
(3, 62),
(4, 68),
(5, 74),
(6, 80),
(7, 86);
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `colors` (
`colorID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`color` VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY (`colorID`)
);
INSERT INTO `colors` (`colorID`, `color`) VALUES
(1, "Red"),
(2, "White"),
(3, "Blue"),
(4, "Purple");
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `product_variants` (
`productvariantID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`productID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`categoryID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`colorID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`sizeID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`sku` VARCHAR(50) NOT NULL UNIQUE,
`quantity` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`isActive` BOOLEAN NOT NULL DEFAULT 0,
PRIMARY KEY (`productvariantID`),
UNIQUE (`productID`, `colorID`, `sizeID`),
FOREIGN KEY (`productID`) REFERENCES products(`productID`),
FOREIGN KEY (`categoryID`) REFERENCES categories(`categoryID`),
FOREIGN KEY (`colorID`) REFERENCES colors(`colorID`),
FOREIGN KEY (`sizeID`) REFERENCES sizes(`sizeID`)
);
INSERT INTO `product_variants` (`productvariantID`, `productID`, `categoryID`, `colorID`, `sizeID`, `sku`, `quantity`, `isActive`) VALUES
(1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 'clalb121', 2, 1),
(2, 1, 1, 3, 2, 'clalb132', 1, 1),
(3, 1, 1, 2, 2, 'clalb122', 5, 1);
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `images` (
`imageID` INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
`imageFilename` VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY(`imageID`)
);
INSERT INTO `images` (`imageID`, `imageFilename`) VALUES
(1, 'shirtwhite1.jpg'),
(2, 'shirtwhite2.jpg'),
(3, 'shirtblue1.jpg'),
(4, 'shirtblue2.jpg');
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `product_variant_images` (
`productvariantID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
`imageID` INT(11) NOT NULL,
FOREIGN KEY(`productvariantID`) REFERENCES product_variants(`productvariantID`),
FOREIGN KEY(`imageID`) REFERENCES images(`imageID`)
);
INSERT INTO `product_variant_images` (`productvariantID`, `imageID`) VALUES
(1, 1),
(1, 2),
(2, 3),
(2, 4),
(3, 1),
(3, 2);
(Im going to remove categoryID from the product_variants table as different variants of the same product does not have different categories.)
Example of querying 1 product for all its variants (In one query):
SELECT
p.productID,
p.name,
p.longDescription,
p.shortDescription,
colors.color,
sizes.size,
pvar.quantity,
pprice.price,
images.imageFilename
FROM products as p
JOIN product_variants as pvar
ON p.productID = pvar.productID
JOIN productpricing as pprice
ON pprice.productID = p.productID
JOIN colors
ON colors.colorID = pvar.colorID
JOIN sizes
ON sizes.sizeID = pvar.sizeID
JOIN product_variant_images as pvari
ON pvari.productvariantID = pvar.productvariantID
JOIN images
ON images.imageID = pvari.imageID
WHERE p.productID = 1 AND pvar.isActive = 1 AND NOW() BETWEEN pprice.startDate AND pprice.endDate;
Example return set:
# productID, name, longDescription, shortDescription, color, size, quantity, price, imageFilename
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'White', '50', '2', '309.99', 'shirtwhite1.jpg'
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'White', '50', '2', '309.99', 'shirtwhite2.jpg'
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'White', '56', '5', '309.99', 'shirtwhite1.jpg'
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'White', '56', '5', '309.99', 'shirtwhite2.jpg'
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'Blue', '56', '1', '309.99', 'shirtblue1.jpg'
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', 'Blue', '56', '1', '309.99', 'shirtblue2.jpg'
As can be seen in the result set the white variant (of one size) of the shirt is associated with two images, therefore there are two records with only imageFilename containing "new data".
Example of using several queries:
SELECT
p.productID,
p.name,
p.longDescription,
p.shortDescription,
pprice.price
FROM products as p
JOIN productpricing as pprice
ON pprice.productID = p.productID
WHERE p.productID = 1 AND NOW() BETWEEN pprice.startDate AND pprice.endDate;
SELECT
c.color,
s.size,
pvar.quantity
FROM product_variants as pvar
JOIN colors AS c
ON c.colorID = pvar.colorID
JOIN sizes as s
ON s.sizeID = pvar.sizeID
WHERE pvar.productID = 1;
SELECT DISTINCT
c.color,
i.imageFilename
FROM images AS i
JOIN product_variant_images as pvari
ON pvari.imageID = i.imageID
JOIN product_variants as pvar
ON pvar.productvariantID = pvari.productvariantID
JOIN colors AS c
ON c.colorID = pvar.colorID
WHERE pvar.productID = 1;
Several queries result sets:
# productID, name, longDescription, shortDescription, price
'1', 'A shirt', 'Long description of this product', 'shortDesc of shirt', '309.99'
# color, size, quantity
'White', '50', '2'
'Blue', '56', '1'
'White', '56', '5'
# color, imageFilename
'White', 'shirtwhite1.jpg'
'White', 'shirtwhite2.jpg'
'Blue', 'shirtblue1.jpg'
'Blue', 'shirtblue2.jpg'
Any advice regarding the database design/queries is much appreciated!