GreenBoi

LIGHTING 1. Lightings.com http://www.lightings.com.sg/ We went to their shops at Jalan Besar and Geylang. Preferred the Geylang branch as we found the sales person, Mr Wong very helpful and good natured. We ended up buying 11w Phillips downlights from them. Its important to note, Phillips downlight comes with built-in drivers. Hence, if it spoils you will have to change the whole light. However, there is no denying that phillips is a good brand and their lights last long. We also bought LED ceiling lights for the rooms and the kitchen from them. 2.Glamour House Lighting http://www.ghlighting.com.sg/ They are located at Geylang. We bought the rest of our downlights from them (phillips dont have stock of the smaller downlights). We bought safety-certified 9w downlights for SGD28 each. It comes with free delivery as well. The owner is super friendly and patient. 3. Ikea Ikea has a wide range of lighting options at good price. We bought a simple pendant light for SGD 20 only. Wife really liked the simple design. BATHROOM ACCESSORIES 1. Bathroom Warehouse by Wan Tai http://bathroomwarehouse.com.sg/ I highly recommend this place. We went to many well known shops, but none compare to this one. The price is also excellent. They also carry a wide range of brands. We bought Grohe rain-shower, mixers. 1 Hansgrohe tall tap. 1 Nobili tall tap, Franke kitchen sink and various other items. They are the only shop that I know that carries a wide range of Nobili, Elkay and Franke products. These are well-known brands that are hard to find in Singapore. They have a wide range of Elkay and Franke kitchen sink (for those who are looking for Blanco alternatives). 2. Adamas Bathroom Pte Ltd http://www.adamasbathroom.com/ We went to their Jalan Besar branch. They gave us the best deal for Fujioh hood/hob and Joven 25L storage heater. We also bought our TOTO WC from them. Recommended! 3. Universal Union Enterprise Pte Ltd http://www.universalunion.com.sg/ If you are the type that dont like doing a lot of walking around and want to purchase everything from one place. This is the place to go! They have almost everything you need- bathroom/kitchen accessories, wide range fan selections (including haiku fans), water filtration system, laundry system The price is competitive. We purchased our industrial design kitchen mixer there. 4. Heritage Bathroom Gallery (Geylang) and Hoe Kee You can also consider these two places. Hoe Kee especially is very well known. They have wide selection of stuffs as well. If you are interested in Blanco kitchen sink, this is the place to go. I would recommend their Kaki Bukit branch. CEILING FANS and VENTILATOR 1. Tai Yong Electric Co at Jalan Besar Hands down the best place to buy fans. Their fans are the cheapest (we combed the entire Jalan Besar). However they dont carry Haiku range of fans. We also bought a KDK ceiling ventilator for our bathroom from them. Highly recommended place. FURNITURE 1. Lorenzo They have great range of leather sofas. 2. Scanteak If you are interested in darker teak woods, this is the place to go. 3. Star Living This is where we purchased most of our furnitures. We like their Scandinavian design and the price is very good 4. King Koil @ Marina Square A wide range of good quality King Koil beds. We will be purchasing our bed and mattress from here. Although a wooden bed would be more scandi in nature, we decided to buy a light colored bed from here for practicality reasons. 5. Picket & Rail Awesome place if you are going for Industrial look. Their beds selection especially is awesome. Unfortunately it doesnt fit our scandi theme. 6. OM Living Good selection of furniture. 7. V-Hive One of the best shops to buy quality office tables and chairs. Their 'Komforte Recliner' range has a lot of nice recliner chairs at good price. 8. Hommage High quality Japanese furnitures. really nice stuff but a bit pricey. But it feels like the price is worth it. FURNITURE SHOPPING TIPS: A good place to do furniture shopping would be at IMM and Furniture Mall (both located next to each other). Most of the furniture shops are located here, hence its easier to get an idea even if you are just sourcing for furnitures/window-shopping. It can be quite a bit of travelling for those living in the east, but its all worth it in my opinion.

Hi Shoe, Yup no wall hacking was done (this will require a Professional Engineer). We decided not to overlay tiles and hacked everything. The main door cant be changed. We are only keeping the closet door and replacing the rest. I will pm Tim's contact to you. System 3+2 is one system 3 and one system 2. It comes with 2 compressors and 5 blowers.

HEATER: I like taking nice hot shower after a busy day at work. Wife on the other hand is not so much into this. As usual we did some research on the heating options we have: 1. Gas Heater Gas heating is cheaper than the other 2 options. Hot water may take 10-20s to reach you (depending on the length of the piping). But it will be constant supply of hot water. You don't have to worry of running out of hot water. Every time you close your tap, you will have to wait 10-20s for the hot water. A single heating unit is enough to supply multiple bathrooms. When it comes to laying the pipes you are at the mercy of the city-gas installer though. This was my first choice. I was super disappointed when I was told my condo does not have Citygas access 2. Instant Heater Slightly more costly than gas heating. Shorter wait for the hot water. However, the water pressure may not be so good. Not recommended if you are going for rain-shower. Multipoint instant heaters are available for more than one bathroom. Wife actually preferred Instant Heating. I was thankful that she agreed to go with the 3rd option as I prefer to hide everything in the false ceiling. 3. Storage Heater This will cost more, if you are like me and dont switch off once the water has heated. However if you are diligent in switching it off, the cost should be the same as instant heater. A single storage heater can easily supply multiple bathrooms. However, the pressure may be lower the farther it is from the main storage unit. Hence, it is generally recommended to have one storage heater per bathroom. You will have to wait 10-15 minutes for hot water if there is no existing hot water in the tank. Some people use timer switch with storage heater (in case you forget to switch it off). In the end we went with the following 2 storage heaters: AO Smith 40L Digital Storage Heater Joven 25L Storage Heater This AO Smith heater is quite interesting. It comes with a blue diamond storage tank which was apparently supposed to keep the water hot longer than a stainless steel heater. It is both an instant heater and a storage heater. It only takes 2 minutes for the hot water to heat up. You also have the option to use the instant heater for a quick shower. There is a nice digital control panel. You will be able to set the water temperature and timer for water heating. Lastly its supposed to be very energy efficient. We have installed it for our MBR bathroom The Joven 25L is highly recommended by many users in renotalk. Its supposed to be energy efficient. Hence our decision to use this for the common bathroom. Now for some more pictures: It was professionally installed by the AO Smith technician. He taught us how to use the digital panel as well. I covered up the digital panel for protection during the reno process. Joven was nicely installed by Nic's plumber Thats all for now guys.

AIRCON: We did a bit of research on this. Mitsubishi, Daikin and Panasonic are often quoted as the best. I'm really not sure about this. My sister-in-law is using LG and its working well. I used Mitsubishi Starmex before and had problems. My wife had good experience with Mitsubishi. Our current place is using Panasonic and it seems to be working well. In the end we decided to go with Daikin system 3+2. This decision was purely on good reviews from people we know and the fact that we have never used it before. haha so we decided to give it a go We obtained quotations from a few people. In the end we went with Tim Wong from Imperial Distributors Pte Ltd. He gave the best quotation. Tim was also very responsive over SMS. He did a thorough site survey for free. He went through my old aircon trunking, looked into the false ceilings. He discussed with me carefully how the pipings etc would be run. His men came and completed the work nicely. There will be a 3rd visit for the installation of the blower and compressors. Tim is highly recommended for the attractive quotation, responsiveness, after-care service and humble personality. Now for some pics: There will not be any visible trunking as it will all be hidden in the false ceiling and L-Box

3D Rendering Nic told us that 3D rendering is by request. So we requested lor He usually gives 3 images but agreed to give us 4 images. We felt that its important to get a feel of the house in order to buy furnitures etc. He did caution us that 3D images are often very different from the actual end product due to different lighting, view angles and difficulty matching with the exact material etc. We appreciate his advice on this. Overall the 3D is a hit and miss: The kitchen is more or less accurate. The tiles should be wood-like though. The study room is rather off from what we wanted. The floor tiles we chose was lighter colour and more towards grey than brown. This was our initial laminate selection for the carpentry but decided to change it to something lighter-coloured. The bookcase would have more shelves. The tables would be slightly bigger. This is not accurate as well. We will be going for more of a scandinavian feel. 3D turned out to be modern! Our wardrobe will be all white in colour with wooden borders. The living room was completely off as well. It is again rendered as modern concept. Our TV console would be mainly white. The TV feature wall should have more grooves. Sofa would be more scandi. The tiles would be completely different.

TILE SELECTION Before deciding to go with tiles. We did a bit of research on laminate and vinyl flooring. We were especially impressed by the Evorich Vinyl flooring. Its looks great and is very durable. We are planning to keep a dog and worried of scratch marks. My previous dog loves to scratch the floor Laminates look great as well. Unfortunately I heard its not-termite proof and was told its not as hardy as vinyl or tiles. Nic and CF took us to Hafary for tile selection about 2 weeks prior to reno. Although I and wife have already decided on the kind of tiles we wanted, we were still spoiled for choice. There were so many options with different colour variations. CF was especially helpful in helping us to decide. Both Nic and CF were very patient ans spent 4hrs with us! Despite that, I and wife had to go to Hafary on another day before we settled on the tiles we like. So here goes. For living room, bedrooms and kitchen: For MBR bathroom. Wood-like tiles would be for the shower area: For common bathroom: For yard and utility room: For yard bathroom: Thats all for today folks. Next time I will upload the 3D renderings provided by our ID and recommended places to purchase various stuffs.