Dwinsplace

House updates! Wetworks look almoooooost done! The last toilet wall to get tiled. Hollow brick wall to separate the kitchen counter is up! This will be painted over without plaster so that we see the texture of the brick. The paint will also seal in the grains so that it doesn't flake off.

Apparently my guy shipped, but didn't update TB with the shipping number. And didn't reply my messages. So only when I asked for a refund then he told me it's already shipped. So thats ONE mystery package solved. I guess the other is the freebie water bottle I saw. To guys using Peeka DIY shipping, I just learnt that once you prepare something for shipment. Its irreversible! I thought I could bundle and find out a quote and then add other stuff in. Apparently they package it and weigh it to give you the quote so they don't undo the packaging. So I will have a TV console that will be shipped alone it seems. Hope it won't cost too much coming alone that way.

Ah yeah i saw those tables. The dark walnut looking series? They even have chairs and benches right? Very expensive though! About 300 for a chair?

I literally laughed out loud at the chalet bit. **** SAD LA! Spend all the money on reno and your friends get reminded of being 16 at east coast... On the other hand... being able to feel 16 again isn't that bad.... When I mention that my house will be industrial I get quite a few faces and comments like "Why would you want to live in a factory?" Haha and to an extent I can see where they are coming from. I suspect the whole industrial loft look came about by artsy people not having the finances to do up their places nicely and so took odds and ends and mishmashed different things together to make ends meet. Then it kinda gained a life of its own. And while it's really getting quite common, I really do love it! Which at the end of the day is what counts yeah? Hmm.. I actually thought cast iron would rust more readily than mild steel. And rust is a very large concern of mine. Esp since my study walls are gng to be made entirely of steel. Have asked the ID to make sure its super protected though. I agree that alu is much lighter and easier to maintain but there is an oomph to steel/iron that it simply lacks. Could you PM me the contacts of the cast iron ppl please? I think it could be worth a look. Oh and good luck with comfort. I hate that sort of thing too. Pisses me off when promises are not met. Don't promise if you can't deliver. And saying that you were using it as leverage for a further discount would have had me exploding into the telephone. Hope it gets to you and that once you see it in your lovely home, all these memories fade away.

love your floors! And I'm personally not a fan of skirting but your colour matches quite well. Adds a little highlight. Nice to see that your workers are so well, hardworking. I think mine leave fairly promptly.

congrats on your nuptials and good luck for the reno!

Not much happening at this point. We have installed the gas heater and routed the gas pipe to the hob area. Waited forever for the guy from citygas to arrive. Called, said he was coming. Called, didn't pick up. Then called he said 15mins. 30mins later called say 10mins. kns. They came, and the wall I wanted to put on apparently wasn't plastered! It was a new wall that was erected and I did ask the ID before the guys came "so how? We paint around the heater is it?" She just went yeah. But I'm guessing she didn't really get that i was asking about that particular wall. Thankfully the lowering clothes hanger thing that we want to get doesn't span the whole service yard and so I could place the heater on one of the end walls next to the entrance and still have the clothes hanger lower itself without hitting the heater. Besides that, I'm just waiting for all my TB purchases to get consolidated at the guangzhou warehouse and then hopefully I'll consolidate it for shipping tomorrow. Unfortunately there is ONE light seller who still hasn't shipped out my product so i'll have to send that on another shipment with the TV console that I bought from TB that also hasn't arrived. Actually, if the guy still doesn't ship by tomorrow, I'm gng to get a refund. Oh! Do you guys get this problem of receiving shipments at the warehouse and you don't know what the item is?? The items on Oops are sorted by Shipping number. Which TB doesn't seem to sort by. So I kinda had to manually find which item it was. And then some sellers sent my purchase of 3 of the same lights, in three different packages with 3 different shipping numbers, but only listed 1 shipping number on TB!! SO i thought that I had everything, but only found out it was an incomplete order when I saw 2 other unknown packages and messaged the seller. Overall, it's only been a little tougher cos I have like 16 purchases at the same time and about 23packages. But it made me wonder if this headache was worth paying Oops to do the buying for me. I currently still have 2 packages at the warehouse that i simply CANNOT account for. I've asked oops if they can tell me more about the package. Maybe it's a free gift? As long as it's not contraband!

Haha I don't actually know the shipping costs of my purchases. For all i know it might be astounding and then I won't save money at all! Can only cross fingers and pray. Yeah I hope the built in cabinetry can be precise enough to accomodate the slants in the wall. I won't want to see a gap at the back of the cabinet.

it might be taking a while but it seems to be coming along nicely. Hang in there! Good things come to those who wait. (and scold a little bit)

Most of the tiling work is done now! Kitchen, balcony and service balcony floors are done. Concrete screed tiles. Its all still really dusty at the moment so you can't see the effect of the tile but we love it. Toilets are mostly done too. Wall tiles are up and I saw that they evened out the floor and waterproofed it. Actually, I wanted to go while they were working on the place to make sure that they don't skimp on the amount of concrete used to paste up the wall tiles. Don't want hollow tiles. Didn't manage to in the end so I guess I will do a check after. The colour of the toilet walls is dark and sexy! Sadly it doesn't come out in pictures so I'll not post it at this point. Maybe once the lights are in. Had a few issues with uneven walls and beams. A tiler told us that an entire wall was slanted and so he would have to make it straight so that we can fit in a door normally. And this was an external wall! I'm living in the leaning tower of pisa.... Anyway, the tiler worked out a good solution in the end so all worked out well. In this pic, we see the top frame of the toilet entrance. And I'm not sure if it comes out in the shot but the tiles looked slanted to me and it was only held up with masking tape! So I thought the tape sagged and it was badly done. Quietly took a spirit rule to it and it seems that the tiles were perfectly fine, but it was the beam itself that was screwy! Lol. Have more faith in my tilers now. One thing that has been bothering me is that I always find bits of food lying around the place after hours. I've told my ID from day 1 that I wanted that place free of food at the end of each day so that rats and roaches don't come. I've heard her communicate this to the contractors too but still I find stuff there. But don't want to scold them in case they don't care about my job anymore. Roar. My parents told me that it's normal and that I should let the small stuff go. Either that or provide a bin for them and then clear it for them if they don't do it. They are probably right, but why am I paying them and then being their maid?? I already buy them coffee and cake lor.... *breeeeathe*

Actually the scratches and dents do add to the character of a wooden floor. I used to always like things shiny and new but maybe as I age myself, I've learnt to appreciate the mark of age in other things too.

Looking at the structure, assembly shouldn't be too tough. Get the other half in on it? Prob just need a spanner, pliers and screwdriver. Peeka gives shipping estimates? Oh thats useful! I've only gone with a rough estimate of 20% of the cost price as given by another renotalker. Ah well, even with $100 shipping, furniture is so expensive in singapore that it works out.

As always, a great source of info OceanEleven! Yeah I took note of the flat part of the gate. I was just trying to come up with a design that would eliminate the need for a steel bracket behind to cover the manual lock. Noted on the tap! Good point and I'll mention it to my ID for sure thanks! My sink is the carysil gtranite but i'm sure it won't be strong enough to take it day in day out also.

My ID always told me, Just apply! You never know what HDB will say. If you apply for 1 change and apply for 3, its all the same. No extra time or charge. So might as well give it a shot. You never know!

Oh yeah?! Did you go for dark walls too? Wah with all the money saved from lights can get new keyboard... new screen... *hai* but better hold back! Spending too much as it is.

These are the links that I've highlighted but pls note that I haven't actually bought them. So i don't know about quality etc. That said, if YOU buy them please let me know if they are good! haha. First link is for the one pictured. Second is for my alternative. http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.0.0.klxGG3&id=37412520216&ns=1#detail http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.0.0.HhTo1g&id=38688667010&ns=1#detail

Parquet is nice. love the feel of real wood. But i'm really scared of the maintenance. Haha it IS a hassle to get started on TB. But once you get started, it really isn't that bad. The service is good! I'm just being super cautious and manually telling everyone that I want them to package carefully cos it will be shipped overseas haha. YOU SHOULD DO IT!!

wow i have to say that you've really gone full into your industrial feel!! Respect! Love the wood panelled up lights on your walls. Fantastic mood

Hey MintyVintage! I think it's really interesting how you went from balinese resort to scandustrial. And quite industrial at that! Lots of unfinished looking laminates with steel. What made you switch? At the start, I was modern industrial, then a bit scandi, then increasingly industrial. Haha. Something about it sucks me in. A black hole of metal and concrete.... Oh! Wanted to ask. Do you remember what the price difference was between aluminium frames for your kitchen and the cast iron that you're currently using? Our ID proposed mild steel at first but the cost was about 2.5times more than aluminium so in the end we went for alum even though the borders are so much thicker and less pretty.

Bold, slick and sexy! Well done! Can imagine a lot of dinner parties around that island. (read alcohol)

I've been spending the whole day trying to chat with different TB sellers to ask for specs, to make sure that they pack it for overseas shipping etc. Just found out that I should also ask if they can flatpack certain items for less shipping costs. But I haven't found out what flatpack is in chinese yet. And apparently, there is a max number of new sellers that you can chat with in a day!! I guess they want to make sure that I'm not a bot out to crash their system. lol. Just as well, my brain was frying from going back and forth from google translate also. I think the CTRL C/ CTRL V buttons on my keyboard are going to break. That said, i must say that so far, its been a pleasure talking to the guys on TB. Almost all of them are very helpful and prompt in their assistance. Once you get things set up on the website and get the hang of where to click for what, its pretty easy getting what you need. Even the chinese gets less daunting but I will be right up against my computer screen reading out loud like an idiot during chinese oral exams. Ahhh... nostalgia....

Made an initial purchase from TB just to test the system and the quality of the items. And it just got here! Please pardon me for not posting any TB links at this time. I will have everything installed and tested and then post the links on a single page. I found that format most useful for me when i was reading other blogs. Bought 2 different LED track lights to test the brightness. 12W and 7W. Only to realise that 1. I bought 1 wrongly as a ceiling mount instead of a track mount. 2. they are both HUGE 3. the best part... i have no existing tracks with which to test the brightness. Bought an edison bulb to test if it was packed nicely and could survive the shipping and its BEAUTIFUL! They are sold for about $20-30 a bulb at lorgan's i think, while its only about $5 from TB including shipping!! My lighting options have just exploded to a whole new level of gorgeousness!! Lastly is the kitchen tap that would go nicely with the industrial look. Very sturdy feel and of a good size. Having the pull hose will be very useful in cleaning the big sink we got. But will only know if its good when the plumber sets it up.

Most of our floor will be a dark brown vinyl. I think our ID is using Kronos brand. We chose to go with tiles for the more oily/wet areas like kitchen, toilets and balconies. Here are our choices! Pardon the bad photos. Concrete screed tiles for that industrial I-don't-give-a-****-look-but-actually-care-alot-about-ease-of-maintenance. Fairly big tiles. Probably 600x600? This will be for the entrance, kitchen and balconies (i think) They tried to convince me to use a cement tile patterned with flowers but it felt too much like a balinese resort so I vetoed it. These were the 2 tiles for the bathrooms that got mixed up by the ID. We wanted darker for the walls and lighter for the floor. We thought the dark colour would be a lovely contrast to the stark white of the WC and sink. Add in some mood lighting and it should be a damned sexy toilet. Anyway, our ID has very efficiently admitted to her mistake, reordered new tiles (darker ones will be in a larger size) which will be delivered on thurs. In the meantime they will work on the other areas. These are our brick stones for the feature wall! ID wanted red brick at first but we wanted a more monotone for the fixed features for a tighter aesthetic. And the colour is called chinchilla! The mrs is really tickled to have large hamsters on our wall. lol! I like that these tiles are alot more distressed than some others i saw at Hafary. A more natural look. Even though, yes.. its fake. lol. Apparently imported from Korea. Gmarket? haha.

Here is a before pic of the house. Yes... it needed a lot of work. So now it kinda looks like this! (view frm main door) (kitchen) (the near wall on the right side will be torn down to be the dining area. The opened up wall behind will be where my dungeon will be )

How did you design your gate to fit the lock nicely? Can take some pics of the back and front? Thanks!