Project House: Weeks 8-10
Oh my, things have gone on a super speed-track since 2012 rolled around!
Everything is coming together nicely and our place is starting to look more and more like a real house. We are very excited!
What's completed so far:
1) Living + Dining Room
The house has been given a complete paint-over. We have a grey feature wall on one side of the living-dining area, the kitchen and rest of the living room are in pure white and the bedrooms a very soft muted grey-brown shade.
All the aircon units, cabinets, ceiling fans and cove lights are in place so the house is looking a lot less bare.
There was initially a bit of confusion about whether the grain of the walnut print laminate run horizontally or vertically on the cabinets but that has since been sorted out. For consistency, I decided to go horizontal for all.
One last outstanding item: We couldn't make up our mind about how tall/wide/open we wanted our bookshelf so we didn't build one in the end. Gonna have to think about that one after we move in and get a better feel of the place!
2) Kitchen
We were quite surprised to see that our kitchen was not all-white like we had imagined.
Due to a slight misunderstanding between our ID and us, only the top cabinets are white while the bottom cabinets had the same walnut laminate as our shoe cabinet and TV console.
A bit disappointing but oh well, I really did not want the contractor to re-do the cabinets. Consolation is, the brown complements the white Corian top quite well.
I do love our custom-made Corian sinks and the very neat smooth-closing Blum hinges/slides and nifty compartments for the drawers (will take close-up pics after I move in)!
Our Ariston cooking hood, hob and oven are also installed and hooked up so we're all set for many cooking adventures ahead!
3) Bedrooms
With the new wardrobes and blackout blinds all in place, the bedrooms are pretty much ready for us to move in.
The original orange-y parquet floors and doors have been re-varnished to a gorgeous dark brown shade. The whole look of the house has been updated instantly from this change alone - this is probably one of the best decisions we have made so far!
All the windows around the house have been installed with 'invisible' grills and frosted glass - I wanted to keep them as-is but the husband is extremely paranoid about privacy and security so we now have super-zhnged-up windows!
The cove lighting for the master bedroom turned out a tad gloomy so we have requested to add an additional layer of row of lights.
4) Bathrooms
Both master and common bathrooms are looking minimalistic and zen-like with the sinks and shelves newly installed.
One major hiccup here that led to the delay of our moving in till after Chinese New Year: Our contractor mistakenly included a glass door for our master bedroom shower (we didn't want one). He also failed to make provisions for our concealed shower mixer and so will need to re-hack the walls to configure the piping and re-do the tiles again.
5) Patio
The wooden trellis structure and decking are up but there is still quite a bit of work left to do.
We also got someone to dig up the entire garden and remove the random plants/trees and re-landscape it with pearl grass. The ground looks a bit bald and patchy at the moment but we have been assured that the grass will grow soon!
Save for the last few fixes around the house (which will happen when the contractor resumes work after CNY), I think we will be able to move in very, very soon!
YAHOOO!!! :)
Everything is coming together nicely and our place is starting to look more and more like a real house. We are very excited!
What's completed so far:
1) Living + Dining Room
The house has been given a complete paint-over. We have a grey feature wall on one side of the living-dining area, the kitchen and rest of the living room are in pure white and the bedrooms a very soft muted grey-brown shade.
All the aircon units, cabinets, ceiling fans and cove lights are in place so the house is looking a lot less bare.
There was initially a bit of confusion about whether the grain of the walnut print laminate run horizontally or vertically on the cabinets but that has since been sorted out. For consistency, I decided to go horizontal for all.
One last outstanding item: We couldn't make up our mind about how tall/wide/open we wanted our bookshelf so we didn't build one in the end. Gonna have to think about that one after we move in and get a better feel of the place!
2) Kitchen
We were quite surprised to see that our kitchen was not all-white like we had imagined.
Due to a slight misunderstanding between our ID and us, only the top cabinets are white while the bottom cabinets had the same walnut laminate as our shoe cabinet and TV console.
A bit disappointing but oh well, I really did not want the contractor to re-do the cabinets. Consolation is, the brown complements the white Corian top quite well.
I do love our custom-made Corian sinks and the very neat smooth-closing Blum hinges/slides and nifty compartments for the drawers (will take close-up pics after I move in)!
Our Ariston cooking hood, hob and oven are also installed and hooked up so we're all set for many cooking adventures ahead!
3) Bedrooms
With the new wardrobes and blackout blinds all in place, the bedrooms are pretty much ready for us to move in.
The original orange-y parquet floors and doors have been re-varnished to a gorgeous dark brown shade. The whole look of the house has been updated instantly from this change alone - this is probably one of the best decisions we have made so far!
All the windows around the house have been installed with 'invisible' grills and frosted glass - I wanted to keep them as-is but the husband is extremely paranoid about privacy and security so we now have super-zhnged-up windows!
The cove lighting for the master bedroom turned out a tad gloomy so we have requested to add an additional layer of row of lights.
4) Bathrooms
Both master and common bathrooms are looking minimalistic and zen-like with the sinks and shelves newly installed.
One major hiccup here that led to the delay of our moving in till after Chinese New Year: Our contractor mistakenly included a glass door for our master bedroom shower (we didn't want one). He also failed to make provisions for our concealed shower mixer and so will need to re-hack the walls to configure the piping and re-do the tiles again.
5) Patio
The wooden trellis structure and decking are up but there is still quite a bit of work left to do.
We also got someone to dig up the entire garden and remove the random plants/trees and re-landscape it with pearl grass. The ground looks a bit bald and patchy at the moment but we have been assured that the grass will grow soon!
Save for the last few fixes around the house (which will happen when the contractor resumes work after CNY), I think we will be able to move in very, very soon!
YAHOOO!!! :)