sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 (edited) My Husband and I are active readers in Renotalk and I thought of sharing our recent renovation experience and our home here. Below is our 4-room floor plan: Like alot of couple in renotalk, we have a hard time finding our 1st flat. First we tried our luck in BTOs but sadly no BTOs development are near our parents' estate. The latest BTOs that we got was getting a chance to select a unit at SkyTerrace@Dawson or Skyville@Dawson. In the end, we got a sad news that the chinese ratio of the development has reached. After all the waiting, we decided to hunt for a re-sale flat instead.... no point waiting for BTOs as firstly we are not getting any younger and the longer we wait, starting a family for us will be even more difficult. Secondly, we want to stay near either of our parents. Thirdly, both our income had hit the income cap to qualify for BTOs. It was not easy to find one that fit our budget as we are trap in the property booming period where COVs are sky rocket. Edited February 21, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mae29 2 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 My Husband and I are active readers in Renotalk and I thought of sharing our recent renovation experience and our home here. Below is our 4-room floor plan: Welcome! Looking forward to your reno photos soon! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 (edited) Our search for IDs is very focus. We zoomed down to two IDs - In.Plan Interior and A&D Interior. After the 2nd consultation, we decided to go with A&D Interior: Firstly, it was recommand by our friend and we have seen their house done up by them and find their worksmanship very good. Secondly, we have heard horrible stories from friends and read from renotalk of how renovation can be delayed by bad IDs, etc. We are short of time as we have to get the house done in less than 6 weeks before our wedding. From our friend's renovation experience with them, they are quite timely with their hand-over. The last thing we want is to handle the contractor, retifying the problems with the renovation and planning our wedding. Lastly, our friend told us their after service are very good too. Our concept for our house is to have a minimalist home, and try not to clutter the rooms with unnecessary stuff. For the living room, we did a tv console & feature wall. And that piece of wall will be painted yellow/orange to give the living a vibrant feeling. One wall will have a photo gallery where we have asked our wedding photographer to take some artistic picture of us. I don't want our wedding photo to be wasted and keep away. I wanted the pictures to be like artworks that we can use it like paintings for the house. To maximise the usage of space, we have the ID to build a shoe cabinate behind the door. Like all old HDB, we have the luxury of having a long kitchen. We decided to section one part of the kitchen to our dining area. For our bedroom, because the toilet is so small, we have no choice but to have a vanity outside the toilet. Initially, it was a walk-in wadrobe but I felt that the wadrobe going to block the light & wind from the one only window in the bedroom. The theme for the bedroom is going to be cozy. Edited February 22, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
february 0 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 Our search for IDs is very focus. We zoomed down to two IDs - In.Plan Interior and A&D Interior. After the 2nd consultation, we decided to go with A&D Interior. Firstly, it was recommand by our friend and we have seen their house done up by them and find their worksmanship very good. Secondly, we have heard horrible stories from friends and read from renotalk of how renovation can be delayed by bad IDs, etc. Thridly, we are short of time as we have to get the house done in less than 6 weeks before our wedding. From our friend's renovation experience with them, they are quite timely with their hand-over. The last thing we want is to handle the contractor, retifying the problems with the renovation and planning our wedding. Fouthly, our friend told us their after service are very good too. Below are the 3D drawings of the house: Nice! Interested to know how you would do up your toilets? Any drawings? Thks! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Greenwood 0 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 Our search for IDs is very focus. We zoomed down to two IDs - In.Plan Interior and A&D Interior. After the 2nd consultation, we decided to go with A&D Interior: Firstly, it was recommand by our friend and we have seen their house done up by them and find their worksmanship very good. Secondly, we have heard horrible stories from friends and read from renotalk of how renovation can be delayed by bad IDs, etc. Thridly, we are short of time as we have to get the house done in less than 6 weeks before our wedding. From our friend's renovation experience with them, they are quite timely with their hand-over. The last thing we want is to handle the contractor, retifying the problems with the renovation and planning our wedding. Fouthly, our friend told us their after service are very good too. Our concept for our house is to have a minimalist home, and try not to clutter the rooms with unnecessary stuff. For the living room, we did a tv console & feature wall. And that piece of wall will be painted yellow/orange to give the living a vibrant feeling. One wall will have a photo gallery where we have asked our wedding photographer to take some artistic picture of us. I don't want our wedding photo to be wasted and keep away. I wanted the pictures to be like artworks that we can use it like paintings for the house. To maximise the usage of space, we have the ID to build a shoe cabinate behind the door. Like all old HDB, we have the luxury of having a long kitchen. We decided to section one part of the kitchen to our dining area. For our bedroom, because the toilet is so small, we have no choice but to have a vanity outside the toilet. Initially, it was a walk-in wadrobe but I felt that the wadrobe going to block the light & wind from the one only window in the bedroom. The theme for the bedroom is going to be cozy. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
lazybum9 1 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 nice pictures...looking forward to more reno pictures...mind sharing your reno cost??? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
alkaline1 0 Report post Posted February 21, 2011 Great kitchen pic; clean and bright! I like minimalist theme. Hmm.. think yours is partial minimalist Looking forward to see more pics and upcoming transformation Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 22, 2011 nice pictures...looking forward to more reno pictures...mind sharing your reno cost??? Hi lazybum9, the total damage is $44k! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 22, 2011 (edited) In 3 days the whole place has been demolished and the contractor has began the floor tilings: Kitchen Study room Guest room Living rooms, the tiles are up! Edited February 22, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 22, 2011 In less than two weeks, the tiles for the whole house are all up and covered for plastering. My husband and I was amazed by the progress of the house renovation. Living room study room Look at how tiny my mbs toilet is.... For the toilets we opt for a spa-like feel by having the walls and the floor tiles to be of the same colour. We chose large pieces of running colour tone homogeneous tiles. And each tiles are quite different in colour. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 22, 2011 (edited) As the renovation progressed to week 3, it starts to slow down. Our ID ensure us that they are waiting for the plasters to dry before the 1st coat of painting and carpentry can proceed. One point I wanted to point out was how my ID help us manage a 2nd contractor. We engaged a closet specialist for our MBR closet. Initially, when we arrange with the closet specialist, they wanted to setup the closet when everything is completed. We tried to negotiate with them to have the false wall setup first as requested by our ID so that the painter & electrician can do the initial work. However, they said that they are short-handed, etc and would only can come down in one day to install the closet for us. We were abit upset and afraid that it might hinder the progress, etc. As such, our ID take the initiative to coordinate for us and everything is settled!!! The ID managed to get the closet specialist to install the false wall for them to work on the painting and electricity At the same time, the false wall between the kitchen and dining area is erected. I love the raised floor from the dining room to the living. I would love to have the kitchen floor to raise up as well, if only the floor can take the load. After purchasing the lighting, I realized that I have chosen the most common light that can be found everywhere. I saw it in my friend house, I saw it in magazine. I think I even saw it in some of the fellow forum's house as well. For the rooms, we decided to have homogeneous tiles that looks like parquet. Edited February 22, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 22, 2011 (edited) By end of week 4, we are overjoyed to have 70% of the renovation completed!~!~~ For the past 4 weeks, the head supervisor aka the ID's brother who is in-charge of all the contractors of the renovation will inspect the progress and worksmanship of the contractors at the end of the day. Most of the time, when we were there to inspect the progress he will be there to do his round of inspection. Before we point out the "defect", etc he has already noted down the changes. I can say he is a very patient and detail person. E.g. he get the worker to protect the shoe cabinet behind the door with a soft stopper, and replace it after renovation with a transparent stopper to prevent the door nod from hitting the doors of the shoe cabinet. One of the thing he did was to ensure all contractors to take off their shoes when the floor protection has been removed by putting up a signage. By the way, the floor was still very dusty. We feel bad to have the workers working around house and getting their feet dirty. But just when you thought that they have earn enough brownie points to trust them, they overlook the height of the dish-drainer!!!!! How can the distance between the table surface and the dish drainer just the height of a bottle??? What use is there for a space like this?? keep bottles?? We immediately called the ID once we saw this problem. The ID was quick to response and was down in about a few hours. As usual, I think no matter how good your ID is, when come to rectify something the first response they have is convince you that its correct. Why? because if they are to re-do the cabinet it will cost them MONEY!!! Re-do= lost of $$$. Second response that they will give you a reason that they are short-handed, blar blar blar... he is not sure how complicated to shorten the distance, and remove it will be a challenge and they might need a week to rectify the situation, this will delay the hand-over time. Next, they will ask you to re-consider not to re-do the cabinet. No way, I'm going to give in. The microwave oven has to fit in that hole!! With the dining room divided out from the kitchen, there is not much space left for the kitchen. Giving us even less working space to cook. Even I have to live with the dust after I move in, I still want my microwave to fit in there. If I don't do it now, I will have to live with this problem forever!~! GOD knows when will I change this cabinet or move out from this house. In addition, to overcome the lack of work space we got the ID to construct a extended pull-out table. To our surprise, the contractor manage to move up the dish drainer, in one day!!! Edited February 23, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
abupapa 0 Report post Posted February 24, 2011 your kitchen and living room pics look gorgeous! can't wait to see the final product. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 27, 2011 (edited) The finished look of the house: Starting from the Living room: My big comfy sofa chair that looks like a super single bed. We start to feel that the wall behind the sofa is abit plain... so we are hunting high and low for painting to add some colours in the living room. Or maybe it should be a mirror art piece? Any suggestion? One of my favourite furniture piece in the house that I have been eyeing very long. The functional coffeetable from Boconcept. We did most of our eating on this table. The TV console. The laminate that the designer chose sometime makes me feel like its some cheap furniture from ikea.... I think it must be the lighting!!!! Edited February 27, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sheepz 0 Report post Posted February 27, 2011 (edited) Our cozy dining area which we don't use most of the time. Glass table with Virta look-alike Eames Plastic chairs. It is too expensive to invest in the real stuff that cost $640 per piece, so we got these look-alike at $140. But I just saw the burger king outlet in Kallang is filled with these chairs too!!! The quality of the chair is not so good, as the screws on the chair legs tend to come out if someone heavy sat on it. The place immediate turn cozy and romantic once the light is switch on. That's the bomb light which I always like to call the light. It looks like a bomb without the glasses. I make my ID sells this light from his office to me!!! Each glass is hand-blown and its supposedly from Italy (claimed by my ID). It took us some persuasion to make him remove this from his office. Well he has three of it, no harm removing one. We still think that the place is too plain... need some colour... perhaps a painting? Anyone has any suggestion where to get cheap and nice looking paintings? Or should we put mirrors instead? Edited February 27, 2011 by sheepz Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
