adrian_john

Agreed, white is indeed easy to go with almost any colour. So that will kinda ease the headache when it comes to furniture or face-lifts in the future. Oh, apart from the Living Room tiles, most of the tiles in tiles selection you saw have been changed actually. The kitchen and balcony will share the same white base-grey striped tiles I mentioned. Whereas, we'll be doing parquet for the rooms now instead. I love those black tiles for rooms actually, but since I've already lived with it for 5 years, I guess parquet is a refreshing change.

Yeah, looks like we have the same colour scheme almost. I initially wanted dark grey tiles for the kitchen floor, but in the end we found this other tile that has a white base with fine stripes/lines to give a slightly light grey and textured effect, so we went with that. I guess black and white is by far a very safe scheme to go with. Quite timeless and brightens the house.

Hiya Rasp. Your reno looks like it's moving pretty well too. Clean look is always good! I love your floor! Real marble is really the best! Our Kitchen and Living Areas will pretty much be following a clean monochromatic (black/white/grey) look. We only made an exception for the 2 toilets and will probably add some colour to the walls in the 4 bedrooms. One thing though, for the toilet wall and floor tiles, the actual colour and effect comes out better and richer when it's 'Live' and under warm white lighting. Somehow under camera flash and white lights it looks very different and sometimes even dull.

TILING UPDATE 2 (Continued) Common Bathroom wall and floor done up. Now awaiting placement of the dark brown strip in the marked out area on the left. MBR Bathroom wall and floor done up.

TILING UPDATE 2 Visited the unit late last night. Tiling work still in progress. They've done up the flooring for both bathrooms. And tiled most of the kitchen. I think most likely they'll be starting on the balcony and living area tiles today. Night view of the Living Area. I must say the house does look quite nice when it's dark especially with the open views. Kitchen divider up and wall tiles done up. Waterproofing has been done for the floor. Just awaiting for it to dry up before laying the floor tiles. Many thanks to Angel for recommending glossy tiles. I think if we had gone with matt ones, it wouldn't have the reflective effect and looked more plain. Divider and Service Balcony wall tiles are also up.

Heya Beany. Saw the good progress for you place in your T-blog as well. Looking good. I wanted to post at your T-blog but somehow I always had some problems, as the IE would close. Don't know why also. Yeah, we're glad we could make the small adjustment. Somehow it provides the wall with a slight contrast. Pet! Welcome back! Haven't seen you posting on RT for some time now! Busy with work? Yup, the tiles were chosen to have abit of the "hotel" or "luxury" theme and feel. Pbtgal, luckily for us the marble-like tiles we found were exactly at $3/psf at Sin Lek. Quite suitable for the 'luxe' theme cos' we couldn't really find any nicer and more luxe looking ones like those anywhere else at that price. Those that are really that nice or nicer, cost almost 3 times more cos' they're from Italy.

TILING UPDATE Just a small update on the tiling work, which started last Friday. They started out with the MBR Bathroom and Common Bathroom walls, then followed by the Service Balcony walls. Just checked yesterday, they've done up most of the Kitchen wall tiles. Most likely finish that part today. Will be visiting the unit later this evening, so will try to take some pics. Common Bath Wall Tiles Actually, after the put up the wall tiles, I somehow felt something was missing about it, when I got home I realised my fault that I forgot to tell Yeak that I had wanted a 4" strip of the darker wall tile (as used in the MBR bath) across the wall of the common for a contrast. Told Yeak when I met him on Sunday to discuss electrical and lighting points and he was quite nice to oblige to get Ah Hui to sort out the strip portion for me. Initially I thought I could just live with it lah, but Yeak was nice enough to say that its not a problem and to get it done. MBR Bath Wall Tiles and Waterproofing Eagerly awaiting to see how it'd look like with the floor done up.

Sorry guys for the late replies. Been quite busy of late, both at work, and settle house sale HDB appointment and going around looking for home stuff for the new place. Thanks pbtgal. Yup, its good to get started. No choice too, gotta rush as I have to handover my current unit to my buyer. How's everything going for yours? Heya Rondy, haven't seen you around for some time now. Yup, the place is a total 100% overhaul, including tiling for the living area. No need for plastering though (Thank God!) cos' the wall condition is pretty OK. Er ... tiling by Ah Hui and his guys started last Friday, now still doing, probably be done only by early next week I think.

HACKING DONE - THE AFTERMATH Visited the new place on Saturday and the whole place has been pretty much hacked up. Tiles have arrived and the workers will probably start laying them this week, and will take about a week plus or so. Living room after hacking. The clump of cables on the right scared me for a minute cos' I thought we had hacked a wall that contained the power cables for the whole block. Mr Yeak clarified that its actually only for our unit's concealed wiring. As we're building a storeroom there, the electrician will help us shift the cables to a corner. The kitchen service balcony area after hacking. The stack of tiles, minus the living room ones kept in one of the bedrooms, plus all the cement, sand and waterproofing materials. The MBR Entrance has been re-opened.

Ahahaha ... I think its all an optical illusion lah. Somehow, it always looks bigger on floor plan and on photos, helped by the layout too. But when you're physically at the location, especially in the rooms. You'll see how cramped the space can be!

Don't think I'll get for living though. I thought of the 22000btu unit for the MBR. Cos' since both rooms are joined together, perhaps I may not need to use the smaller 9000btu unit in the adjoining room but use the larger one to power both? Gotta check with the air-con people.

Simon, Jaden's really a very cute lil' fella. He also seems very active, alert and observant too, which is good - Grow up to be a smart, savvy kid!

Hehehe. Thanks for the comforting consolation Angel. I feel much better about it now. Yeah, I guess we'll seldom use it except to shower in or maybe once in awhile, let the kids play bubble bath. Also, my wife ever slipped in the bath and knocked her head badly before, so I think she also phobia. Anyhow, I bought normal shower mixers already. So bathtub has effectively been ruled out.

Yup, guess yours and mine's concurrent. Mine started yesterday. We initially wanted to put a tub back there to enhance and fit with the 'hotel-style' bathroom look. But in the end, we decided not to for safety considerations, due to the 2 small hyper kids. I just hope its a decision I won't live to regret. The MBR in my current place is also quite small. We solved the problem by sourcing out very compact and small glass bowls with a mount, and even for the mirror cabinet, we found an ultra-slim and compact one. Bretz at Park Mall has quite good solutions for compact and slim stuff, but of course, it comes at a price. You can try checking it out.

Booy, thanks for your feedback on the Starmex! So far alot of good feedback on it. So I guess I'd opt for it. Probably take a higher powered one for the master (maybe 18000 or 22000btu) and normal 9000btus for the rest. Heya PJ. Reno started yesterday. I popped by in the evening and the whole house (whatever was posted in the pictures) is pretty much hacked away already.

Hahaha, i guess that's one of the pitfalls of suspended cabinets and hollow openings! I remember when i was a kid, i used the hollow bottom of living room rattan sofas for 'houses' for my playmobil figures.

Hahaha, i guess that's one of the pitfalls of suspended cabinets and hollow openings! I remember when i was a kid, i used the hollow bottom of living room rattan sofas for 'houses' for my playmobil figures.

Ivy: So interesting to see your son's concept of parking under sheltered car park! My 2 boys converted my entire living room space into a Thomas the Tank Engine railway line and 'city'. Walking hazard for us adults. Booy: I think somehow all boys grow up liking cars, trucks, trains and planes. My elder son now getting the hang on painting - I just worry he end up painting the newly-painted walls at my new place!

Hi Beany, Both your feature walls really look nice. The lighting effect does bring out the texture and some interesting shadows too. Your home's growing into that very cosy, resort feel. Hope to pop by one day to meet you guys when its ready.

Had some spare time today, so just did up the revised floor plan on floorplanner. Funny thing was it didn't allow me to save and export to an image file. So I had to capture based on screen shot.

Yeah, the weird corners, particularly the slanted wall at the MBR window, did give us quite abit of a headache and inflexibility in terms of placement of furniture and facing of our bed in the MBR. Also as usual, there's always the perpetual Bishan Beam problem and not to mention, I hate the way the sewage pipes are laid out. The common toilet has 2 pipes directly at the shower area, and there's some running overhead in the MBR bath, which deprived me of having a rainshower. But I guess now, I'm glad everything is more or less finalised and its good to get the reno moving. I think despite the place being windy, I'll still install Air-Con lah. You'll never know when S'pore will have hazy or hot spells. Maybe the previous owner's heat tolerance is better than my family's too! How's your Starmex so far? I'm deciding between the 2 Mitsubishi brands.

Thanks Rusty. One of the things we like about our new place is that there's totally unblocked view for all the bedrooms and balcony. Yeah, its quite windy throughout the day too. The previous owner was sharing that they don't even need to switch on air-con. I was thinking tempered glass would be a good way to minimise blocking the view, is more durable (cos' I heard from previous owner that sometimes heavy rain will blow quite furiously onto the door) and easier to open. I hope to leave it clear but I think better to put decals before my parents or kids run and bang into it.

Some BEFORE pics of the MBR Views of the Inner Wall of the MBR, where the Bathroom entrance and dresser will now be located. Another view of the Inner Wall of the MBR, where the Bed's head will be placed. View from Inner Wall showing the window and link to the next room, where the wardrobe will now be. The wall on the right will be broken down to make an entrace to the MBR View of the adjoining room to the MBR from the link Inside view of the MBR showing both vanity and shower area

BD: Maybe its just optical illusion and because its empty. But definitely bigger than my current place for sure. Yes Angel, its hard and I'm trying my best to chill and look the other way. We actually thought of keeping the doors cos' the previous owner told us it cost quite a bit. But the condition of the wood and the tracks is rather bad and rotten, and it'd be quite expensive to re-do it. We'll sadly be removing it. Now thinking perhaps to replace it with a tempered glass sliding door instead to maintain a clear view.

Some 'BEFORE' pictures to show of the new place. It sure looks spacious when its empty, but I think it'll be quite cluttered once things are up and furniture is placed. LIVING ROOM & BALCONY VIEW FROM KITCHEN ENTRANCE LIVING ROOM VIEW FROM BALCONY - Showing Foyer, Kitchen Entrance, Storeroom Slot and Corridor to Rooms KITCHEN VIEW FROM SERVICE BALCONY SERVICE BALCONY