cj07

Yes! Laminate doors are good and unique. Andrew suggested that I get laminate doors, similar to what you had, because he saw that we had a hard time deciding on the veneer doors. Haha... that was a superb suggestion by him.

Living room - Bar counter. Probably our "highlight" for the reno. Like that it is curved downwards. This doubles up as dining table. Gonna add a rack to put the wine glasses below the table too. Anyway, good service from Andrew - the initial bar counter was only in 1 colour - the beige shade. As we felt that it was too plain, we asked him if he can get the carpenters to change the laminate for us to the flora design at the side for a bit of contrast. He agreed without hesitation - and the next time we saw it, the laminate is changed. No extra cost even. TV console - No feature wall for us, no suspending console. Just the old school TV console which sits exactly at the plug point and we added more power points to accomodate the WII, PS3, SCV, HTS, TV...and counting. Where we will be cooking. Got a slim hood in the same dimensions as the cooker. Full height cabinet with oven in the kitchen. The fridge shall be on its right by the window. Washing area - plumbers not in yet, no tap installed yet. This is on the other side of the wall opposite the full height oven.

Update on Progress! Our unit is scheduled for handover 3 Mar, but after checking today it is almost ok for handover, just a pesky drawer that refuses to close properly despite having the soft closing mechanism. anyway some pics after that initial painting... MBR wardrobe is up, dresser at the corner near the 3/4 height windows MBR door - we opt for laminated doors in contrast to wardrobe door. Effect was good! Close up of the floral laminate on the wardrobe. MBR toilet entrance - Due to the big entrance, we opted for fixed glass at the side. Also so that the vanity top in the toilet will not be restricted by the wall. Glass shower screen in MBR toilet

Dimmable Lights Let me digress a little... During the course of reading the many T-blogs in RT, I came across this set of dimmable lights - Philips Easyscene The bulbs are energy saving bulbs with E27 base. What this means is that the bulbs can be fitted onto any E27 holder and used immediately. Not only that, the bulbs can be dimmed/brightened using a remote control. Sounds like loads of fun. However, the downside is the cost. The Easyscene starter kit costs $99 for 1 remote and 2 bulbs. Each additional bulb costs around $37 I think. The start-up cost is slightly higher, but it would be great fun to entertain guests with the Easyscene.

Thanks. I had a hard time searching for this lamp. It was a good thing I manage to find this original piece in almost mint condition. Andrew was shocked at the condition of the lamp. He couldn't believe that it was a 2nd hand lamp. Even the Zenterra people were surprised at the good condition of the lamp when they were preparing to install it.

Hi Dennis, The hansgrohe that we got was the Focus E2 series - basin mixer bath mixer The showerhead can be seen in my photo. These items were sold as a package hence I bought them. The package price was $388.

My office colleagues are buying too, so probably I will tag along their group buy instead. And I agree with Battle.. your long island and WIW is Battle, have fun doing reno with Andrew. I certainly enjoyed my reno with Andrew.

Lights! Inspired by fellow renotalkers (defelio, jumpstreet and petetherock), I wanted to get the PH5 too. Contemplated for the longest time to get a replica from Light+Form Concept, until I found an online seller who is selling the original 2nd-hand. We also checked out the online shops - Nostraforma and Connox, but found the prices on the high side. Therefore I emailed the owner, and he found one which is almost in brand new condition. It was a steal at EUR280, and we added EUR40 for shipping. He offered to clean it up for us prior to shipping it out as well, and all's good! Box it came in: Yellowed coz it's a vintage! In fact the lamps were hanging at some local council canteen in the 1970s in Germany, until it was removed. This was one of the rare few with the box and in almost mint condition. Looks good when it's finally up! Because of this light, our ID advised us not to install any L box, false ceiling, etc. as we told him this will be our centerpiece for the living room. Very glad at his initiative, we can save some $$ from there.

So with the big ticket items done, and we had set our minds on the VRH bathroom accessories, we went over to Sim Siang Choon in Changi instead. That is their headquarters, which is also the largest showroom in Singapore. Decided that shopping there would be a more comfortable experience. The showroom is huge, spacious, and has almost every type of bathroom fitting imaginable. It features an ikea-style kind of shopping, where you take a list and a pencil, walk around listing the code number of the items you would like to purchase. After that, just hand it over to the lady at the counter and they will get the items from their store (wherever that is) for you. They even have measuring tapes that looks exactly like ikea's. All to make shopping a better experience. Highly recommend anyone who would like to go SSC to make a trip down if it is not too inconvenient. In the end we bought the following: Not in the photo: towel rack and one other toilet roll holder. We got everything from VRH - our house bathrooms can become showroom for VRH already.

We struck gold when we went to Universal Union. Lying discreetly on the floor when we first stepped in, we zoomed in on the granite sink immediately. At 533 x 457, it is the smallest granite sink found yet, and it fits our requirements perfectly. That was a good sign and we decided to just browse around to see if we can find other bathroom fittings. Went upstairs and chanced on their Grohe and Hansgrohe fittings. For some strange reason, Grohe was more expensive than Hansgrohe. There was a promotion going on then for the Hansgrohe shower and tap mixer set, starting from $368 onwards. That was the price for the shower head, handle bar, shower mixer and tap mixer. We thought of getting only the tap mixer for our MBR bathroom, however that alone cost almost $200! So it made sense to get a set instead. Having shortlist the 2, we more or less decided that we will get the MBR basin from them, but we spent a long time but couldn't find any. The sales person was really patient with us, she offered to email the pictures of sink from the catalog if she finds something relevant. Anyway we left empty-handed the first time round, deciding to see if we can find a nicer sink from elsewhere. In the end, we couldn't forget about the Hansgrohe set and the fact that it is value-for-money, so we decided to go back Universal Union and purchase our stuff. That was one week later. Our shopping: Granite Sink - exact same colour Hansgrohe - A little luxury for us! Other stuff we bought were the basin and tap for the sink. Comes with free delivery. By the way, we bought a towel rack initially however decided to change our mind before the delivery. So we cancelled it and there were no issues from Universal. Very good service!

Continuing our accessories shopping. Next place we visited - Sim Siang Choon (IMM). Everything felt cramped and compressed in this branch. Like Hoe Kee, the sales assistants generally left us alone to do our browsing. Again, we did not find any sink that caught our fancy, although SSC had this "Astro" brand of granite sink. But the dimensions did not suit us. However, we did find some accessories that we liked and decided to shortlist - VRH range of accessories. Based on the product description, the items are made in Thailand (not MIC!!) and the range of stainless steel is the higher grade SS304. For those who are interested, here is their website VRH . However, not all the range of accessories are available in Singapore, which is a pity as I really liked some of the items in the website. In the end, we still could not find the elusive kitchen sink made of granite with dimensions of 600mm or smaller. Our hunt for the sink continues...

Hi battle, Thanks. Actually I am done shopping already. This is like a re-cap of what happened. Remember to upload more photos once your reno starts.

Hi Battle, I see that you got Andrew too. May_dream1, you started using the Happycall pan? I am interested to get that too.

Next few items on the shopping list - Toilet Accessories After reading numerous postings in RT, we shortlisted the following shops to visit a) Hoe Kee (IMM & Genting Lane) b) Sim Siang Choon (IMM & Changi South) c) Universal Union The items that we intended to get were: 1)kitchen sink 2)kitchen mixer 3)towel rack 4)spray set x 2 5)toilet paper holder x 2 6)shower corner rack 7)bathroom basin to fit on vanity top 8)Any other items that pop up in our minds along the way a)Hoe Kee (IMM) A good range of items to view but nothing that caught our fancy. The shop assistants generally left us alone to browse the items in the shop. We thought the ROZ brand of mixer tap looked good but we did not see any kitchen sink that we liked. b)Hoe Kee (Genting Lane) Much more spacious than the IMM branch as this was the main branch/HQ. It was at this place that we spotted the kitchen sink that we wanted - the BlancoLago Silgranit The sink had dimensions of 615x510x190mm. Just what we wanted. Plus, there was an on-going promotion so the sink was so attractive at $399. Fortunately or unfortunately, the color that we wanted was not available. Hence we decided to KIV the Blanco. In the end we left Hoe Kee empty handed.

Not yet. Andrew is trying to get the plumber in by tomorrow to resolve it. I just reminded him last night.

Talking about shopping... With Kitchen necessities done, we moved on to the electrical appliances. Fridge, TV and a washer/dryer. For the fridge, again we knew that we had to get as small as we can. However not willing to compromise on the 2-door fridge, we scouted around for a small but tall enough fridge with a capacity of around 400L. As usual, the width of the fridge cannot exceed 600mm. To think of it, 600mm is the magic number for the kitchen...our hob and hood is 600mm, sink also, and now the fridge too. Because of this width, we narrowed down our choices considerably - we found a Hitachi brand model (R-S37syps)with 3 doors which met the criteria while shopping around in one the big electronics stores. At $1099, it was slightly above budget but still acceptable. The capacity was less than 400L but ok to us too. It was later that the sales lady knew we were looking for 600mm-wide fridge, she suggested a 6-door hitachi fridge (r-sf42ams) to us. It was a hefty price tag at $2399!! The difference in the jump was the place of manufacture - one is in Thailand, the other is in Japan. Anyway the reason she suggested that was due to the fact that it is made in Japan, which is known for their quality. We were quite impressed with the depth of the fridge and that it could store up to 415L, which met our criteria. However the price was a huge deterrent and we decided to KIV it for a while. Subsequently, we went shopping again and found another helpful salesman who introduced the Panasonic Inverter fridge to us. It is also made in Japan, 3 doors, auto-ice maker, and a nice roulette style storage. lol. Best of all, only 590mm width! The price at that time was around $1.5k, above our budget, but definitely cheaper than the hitachi one for an almost-equivalent item. With inverter technology, it will also help us save on electrical bills in the long run, so we were definitely sold. Specs here: http://www.panasonic.com.sg/wps/portal/home/products/homeappliances/kitchenappliances/refrigerator/3door/NRC376MXS6

It's been a busy weekend for both of us. Our ID arranged for both electrical and plumbing to be done yesterday, and we were there the whole day supervising and ensuring that everything should be there in the correct place. Finally the house has light! However, while electrical was smooth, the plumbing was a problem...the plumbers came late, and were rushing to finish everything before 8pm. It wouldn't have been so bad if they did a good job....but today when we decided to drop by the house in the morning, we noticed puddles of water in our MBR toilet... in 3 spots - 2 spots in the vanity cabinet below the basin and behind the toilet bowl which they fixed the bidet spray for us. Called the ID up immediately and told him about the problem...however the plumbers do not work on Sundays!! So no one to come and rectify. So our ID suggest that we turn off the water supply and he will call the plumbers in again tomorrow. Hopefully the problems can be solved soon.

They try to make it more spacious by hacking off one wall and replacing it with glass. At least, that was what I remembered the last time I went there. The kitchen is definitely not to size - there are so many things to consider, ie. piping, gas pipes, etc. There is a "fixed" place in the kitchen to place the cooker and sink, or else you need to re-route which will cost $$$. Anyway, 3 years very fast over. I'm sure it will be faster since HDB is expediting all the construction work.

Shopping time! The first few items that came to our mind were kitchen items - Hob, Hood and Oven. These had to be built-in so it was important we buy them first in order for our ID to place it around the kitchen. We only have 2 criteria for the hob - glass hob & as small dimensions as possible due to our really tiny kitchen space. The wife had a criteria - GLASS hob. So that narrowed down our choices considerably. The first glass hob which we found that had 700mm length was the Turbo Incanto 703VTSC-COL-2 triple burner. Actually I preferred the Rinnai Schott Ceran inner flame glass hob, but alas, its was just too big. Turbo was the choice, until one day when we were walking around in Best Denki in IMM and found an even smaller hob! At 600mm length, it fit our dimensions exactly. We decided to go for this and got a matching hood in 600mm length to go along too! The oven was recommended by our supplier - Zero, whom we got the contact in Renotalk. Instead of the EF oven which we chose to go along with the hood and hob, he suggested to purchase a Rinnai oven - made in Italy, with far more functions than the EF oven which we wanted. Therefore for a difference of $150, we decided to go for the Rinnai oven - RBO-7MRX. Our kitchen appliance shopping - COMPLETE!

Hi Confidential, Yes, the original basin was removed so that the vanity top, cabinet and shelf can be installed. We had to find another basin to place on the vanity top as well.

Here is how our kitchen will look like based on our ID's drawing on our wall tiles... No more L-shape kitchen though, because our cooker has to be placed near to the wall. 3 days later...our carpentry is finally ready to be installed! our ID told us that we are the first customer after CNY for the carpenters - meaning ours will be ready soonest. Yay! MBR Wardrobe with dresser near the window Our MBR bathroom vanity top. Laminates are in for the full height shelf - also some woody colours in order to fit the yellowish tiles. Our basin is placed there for them to cut the hole. Kitchen sink side (opposite side from the drawing)

Welcome! Will try to post more photos (if i actually remember to take it) Where's yours? BTO too?

Sorry for lack of updates, been busy at work. I will try to bring the reno up to speed, as it is still ongoing. 2 days later after the tiler, the painters came! My ID thought it would be better to do a full painting before anything goes in, and then do touch up after installation of all carpentry. We chose all brownish/beige tones for the walls, painted on 1 side as a "feature" so that the rest of the room is white. We decided not to go for dark colours due to the small size of the room, and to make it seem spacious we decided to go for neutral tones. Bedroom 1 colour MBR colour Check out our bi-fold door that was ready in 2 days! Impressed by the efficiency. Even our ID didn't know that they were delivering it that day. Almost made a mistake - they thought the bi-fold was for the kitchen till we told them it's for the toilet. Disaster averted. Living room colour And then it was until 3 days later before anymore action on the house... Citygas piping in! Electrician came to pull the wires out for the hood and oven, plus some other points in the living room. I route it to the full height cupboard then back to the same area. This is for safety purposes as our cooker will be near the wall and my concern is what if it gets too hot when cooking.

I ask him when I see him later this week lo.. haha ya, I agree that the tiler is good! In the midst of doing the kerb, he discovered that there would be some ponding issue after constructing the kerb so he proposed to create a drain to solve the issue. Ya, thanks to your recommendation that's why I have such a good ID

Our ID is Andrew from Designer Guy, recommended by one of the renotalker here. He is half-contractor half-ID, coz he has lots of experience (hands-on since he started out as a tiler) and also give good design ideas. Agree that find ID must be careful, there are those who are only "remote control", just call the sub-contractors from their office and never go down to the actual site. If that's the case, how will they know the progress and whether any problems arise? So if you haven't found yours yet, take your time. Find someone who can "click" with you is most important. we also often admire your flats from afar, when going down JT Hall road. Haha. Very outstanding!