Almost Home!

As I write this I am doing the proverbial "watching paint dry"! My builder has precut all the skirting boards and I am staining them with Japan Black so that he can install them tomorrow. I love this paint, even though it's a turps clean up- yuk! However it looks great when done and is also the magic ingredient to pull off the "Hampton's" look for a house reno. Which I am not trying for, but for interest if that's the look your after the black floor boards will get you home!

Anyway this paint is supposed to have a 12hr re coat time, but I am doing a rotation in the sun and hoping to have the 2nd coat on much sooner. I'm also not after a perfect look, so I'm then finishing them off with bees wax for a bit of a pre loved look hopefully.

It's been a huge busy week here, hence my lack of postings. It started with my builders cutting the brick wall in preparation for the connection later this week. This was their last  chance to do it as they needed to use a wet saw which means water everywhere. So they laid plastic everywhere on the floor and taped it really well then Doug my builder and I used the wet vacuums to soak up the water while Darren his son cut. We did well and it didn't penetrate to the polished concrete. (That's the kids little weekend craft projects sitting on the blue table- plaster cast moulds!)

Here's Darren getting ready to cut looking more like a trawler fisherman than a builder!

Now some exciting stuff. Here's how it currently looks.

This is the view looking from the current kitchen which will be our connection point down towards the fire place in the lounge room. That's a pile of boxes in the back corner, coming in from the old shed, in preparation for it's pull down and also the kitchen island bench minus the stone top.

The view in thru one of the bi-fold doors with the kitchen taking shape. The walls are clad with myrtle veneer.

Check out this little spunky monkey- it's the trapeze lighting in my new office.

This is the big high bay light over the lounge. I have 4 of these. They hang about 1.2m's down from the ceiling. The power in the new section is connected now.

This is the custom stair stringer lying near the wall of the old and new. The plumber will be here later this week to connect up the new kitchen. Once that's done he'll disconnect the old kitchen which is currently where our stairs are going and then we can knock out the wall and become one! All going well next weekend we should be living in the new section.

Plantation Breezes

The past week has been really busy here at my house. Currently the cabinets are going in, the light fittings have been delivered and the sparkie is here wiring it all. The builders continue on with their progress and tomorrow the pool fence gets inspected and then it should be finished next week. I will do a post on the house later this week when there are some great progress pics to show. 

However, I did get a quote for plantation shutters earlier this week. I've had them in previous houses and they always look great. When I was recently in North Qld visiting Port Douglas so many buildings had the shutters. It truly felt like its one of those locations in the world that they are the perfect choice for windows and doors. The tropical surroundings, warm temperatures and bright sun with balmy nights are the perfect combination.

Check out this gorgeous hotel just up the road with the very Mediterranean look.

These next few are on the main street of Port Douglas. You can easily see that shade and breeze are the priorities in this climate.

I loved everything about this development. the exposed rafters, the huge awning overhangs and that very modern Mediterranean look, as well as the beautiful tropical landscaping.

The rusty left side building is the iron bar, one of the most popular pubs. The building on the right definitely had that plantation feeling.

The famous Veranda Bar, filling up with crowds watching the Saturday afternoon football broadcast.

This was a cul-de-sac with several large houses leading off it. I loved the stone pillars, lipstick palms and general tropical gardens all giving a wonderful Balinese look.

VJ's and Veneer

We're heading towards the home stretch for Stage 1 and being able to move into the new section. This is how the house currently looks. This is the southern elevation with the white boards at the top finished off , but still to be painted the dark charcoal, the chimney flue in, the external side of the fire place boarded in and the windows installed. Once the old shed is removed the deck goes on and wraps around this southern side.

All the windows are now in. These 2 tall louvres are in the laundry and the smaller end window is the wc. They are black aluminium and look great with the other modern finishes.

The top 3 sections of louvres are in and the large bi fold doors should be finished off this afternoon. You can see just below my builder is a section of the veneer wall sheeting, which is currently being installed. The ceiling has also gone in and is now all painted. The lighting cables are hanging down.

Often on these postings I attach photos of me dressed up attending events with champagne and canapes, so I am swallowing my vanity to show a very different side. During the reno I have been getting my hands dirty and having a go at some things myself. This was when I cement rendered a previous window that was relocated. I wanted to match the existing render which now becomes a part of my office. I am quite proud of my effort for a first time. I have also been jackhammering, concreting footings for paving and painting. And quite often by the end of a project I end up filthy and smelling disgusting. But there's also great satisfaction in doing something yourself.

Here's the end result with the plastic drop sheet ready to be pulled off. Whilst all this is happening on site, the joinery is underway including the stone bench tops. The plumbing fittings and lights are waiting to be delivered and the stairs are being 2 packed and the stringer powder coated.

Eye Catchers

Here's a few things from out and about.

The always stylish (and never cheap) window dressings of Louis Vuitton.

The glass roof of the T&G Arcade Brisbane. The flowers were a deep red, but the overcast sky wasn't showing the colour.

And one right up my alley- cute shoe handles on the front door.

Oh so Polished!

Whenever I've done reno's in the past there are always a couple of features that I get very excited about waiting for them to happen. This is one of them- my polished concrete floor.

It involved 3 days of incredible noise and dust, but it looks great now. One thing I did find out along the way is that when you order the concrete and mention it will be a polished finish the concrete supply companies try to convince you to buy a special mix with very pretty pebbles and colours. These mixes are about double the price per meter of standard concrete. As I've been specifying polished concrete floors for years in my store designs I only wanted the normal standard concrete and I'm very pleased that I went this way. I love the blend of the aggregate.

You can see the dust that the polisher is making. Even though most of it is being directly sucked into the vacuum a fine film still ended up covering everything.

Here's another look at my finishes as I've now finalised them.

And today the pool fence was finished then the pebble finish will be applied in a week or so.

The writing's on the wall

Here's a simple but interesting hotel foyer from my travels. The repetition of the arched lamps was quite striking as you entered.

The aqua and brown theme was echoed through out with the striped upholstery and the lovely window mounted shells.

But this is my favourite part- the simple and inexpensive vinyl cut lettering creating a cool wall feature.

All good motto's I think!

house progress

For the past couple of weeks there have been lots of small jobs happening on site. I've noticed the progress as I've been looking around, but it hasn't been like the major work at the start that gave an instant huge impact.

This was my effort from the other week. It's the old painted wall of the "add on" external laundry.

The little doorway goes into the crawl cavity under the house where the existing hot water system is housed. This will end up under the new internal stairs. As the brick wall will be visible with the new stairs I wanted to strip off the paint and go back to the natural brick. Paint stripper and the high pressure cleaner were a magic combination and had the paint off in no time. The rest of the white wall will be either demolished or covered over.

This is the central double sided fire place with the blue board sheeting that the stone finish will stick to. The back and side fascia boards were put up.

The rest of the stud walls went in. There's not a real lot of walls as the new extension is mostly open plan.

Last Friday was a busy day with the plumber and electrician here roughing in. This tall stud wall is the kitchen with all the appliances going along this wall. Behind it is the laundry. I have stuck up the sections of plans all around the house so that the contractors could refer to these for heights of power points, taps and plumbing etc. These are the joinery plans that the cabinet maker has started working on.

Here's the fire place in the box ready to be lifted into the its cavity.

This was a bedroom window that we've now sheeted in as it's become an internal wall. This is actually my new office and I'll have the exposed bricks covered to the full wall height with open shelves. The blue board will be rendered over to match the existing fawn coloured render.

This was the old back door now also sheeted in as it will become a new bedroom in the existing house with cabinets covering it on both the new and existing house sides.

Next week the concrete polisher is due and then once he's finished it's all go with about 4 trades coming in and some major work happening such as wall, ceiling sheeting, windows and doors plumbing and electrical fittings.