SaltedCaramel

Bold choices on the laminates of your kitchen cabinets and it turn out really well!

Actually, the original position of the hob and sink were at different side but I moved the hob next to the sink. I am thinking of picking up baking so I thought the clear countertop space at the other side will be useful. Yea, nothing beats the feeling of coming back to your own home!!

Congratulations ZzzMonster on the completion of your renovation and moving in! Must be busy furnishing your home now? Yea, I also just realised that can use phone camera to take panorama photo. Sighh... didnt know about it during the renovation so no panorama photos during the renovation.

It is that way so i can say hello to my neighbour when washing the dishes. Just kidding! We didnt place the sink directly under the dish rack because it will be too close to the hob. Our kitchen is L shaped. We want the sink and hob to be on one side as we want the other side to be clear countertop space.

Thanks Peachydurians! You have very good memory - still can remember that I like to read

Congratulations Peachydurians! I really love the design of your kitchen . Happy moving and settling in! I am using simmons which I bought from Robinsons Orchard for $2.4k. Loving it!

Study Room We hacked the walls of the study room and replaced it with aluminium framed glass panels. e adore the aluminium framed glass panels! Our house looks much bigger and brighter with the glass panels. View of the study room from the dining area View of the dining area from the study room The carpentry we did for the study room - wardrobe, study table, book shelves and bay window settee-cum-storage The storage space of the bay window settee We installed Venetian blinds at the study room

Kitchen Our kitchen is pretty small so no island for us . If the kitchen is big enough, I would love to have 2 rows of cabinets with an island in the middle. Different views of our kitchen cabinet Full view of our L-shaped kitchen cabinet with Black Galaxy granite top, white subway tiles backsplash, black kitchen sink, black tempered glass hob, stainless steel chimney hood and built-in oven. Sighhh… we wish we have chosen a white countertop. We think it will look nicer and make the kitchen looks brighter. Close up view of our black kitchen sink from Blanco. As our kitchen is small, we chose a tall and slim fridge. The dimensions of our Hitachi fridge are only: 1,816mm (H) x 590mm (W) x 630mm (D). Would love a side by side fridge but our kitchen is too small for it.

Yea, it's the study room. Glad we hacked the wall and replaced with glass panels cause it makes the whole house looks much bigger.

Thanks Sunnydays7777! My curtains were up after the chemical wash. I think it should be up after chemical wash though I am not too sure.

Thanks hc28!

doubleEM, congrats on moving in! Can start enjoying the fruit of your labour The progress of your renovation is really fast. Love the look of your staircase railing!

Your renovation is looking good! Haha... My contractor also rarely updates me on the progress. Every visit to my house is a surprise.

It has been awfully long since I last updated! *sweep cobwebs away*. Had been busy with unpacking and furnishing the house. Let me update with pictures taken before the handover. Living and dining View of the living and dining from the main door The laminate was laid vertically from the main door to the balcony. We read that this can create an illusion of a longer/bigger space if the direction of the flooring is towards a light source (e.g. balcony or windows). Loving the rustic look of the laminate. Living room before installation of curtain We asked the carpenter to fix some ledges for us to display some decorations - pottery, photo frames, sculpture etc. Living room after installation of curtain We installed curtains at the living room and Venetian blinds in the 3 rooms. As the Venetian blinds are quite heavy and not easy to roll up, we installed curtains at the living area so that we can access the balcony easily. Close-up shot of the TV console and brick wall We love how our TV looks mounted on the white brick wall. The shoe cabinet and bookshelves We love to read and decided to build a bookshelves to display our collection of books. Don’t like it enclosed so I guess I will have to deal with the dust. We had requested for ventilation holes for the shoe cabinet and did the same for our vanity cabinets. Dining Please ignore the pendant lights as we have yet to adjust the height of the lights .We like the colour temperature of the LED track lights - very warm and the brightness is just nice.

Will be posting more pictures soon! Our experience with Alan had been good and we enjoyed working with him. We are pleased with the workmanship and progress. Other than a few hiccups, our renovation journey had been smooth. Workmanship can be rather subjective and from our limited experience (this is our first renovation), the workmanship is good.

Thanks Dandan. Sorry for the late reply. Hope my reply is not too late. I would say the colour is white with a tinge of yellow. I had taken the photo below under natural light.

My renovation had been completed and I have just moved in. All these are back-dated entries .

Hi thehappykowple, Your house is nicely done up! I got my lights from Verde Lights and dining table and bench from Ethnicraft too! *High five.

Congrats on moving in! Your home is simple and beautiful.

Box-up of aircond trunking, plastering and painting Box-up of aircond trunking was nicely done. Our whole house were painted white. We chose Snowflakes (Code 1164) from Nippon Odourless series. Before painting, our house looked dim as the paint had turned yellow. After a new coat of paint, our house looked so much brighter! The painting was ok though there were some areas especially at the door or window frames where it was not done nicely. The painter should have masked these areas properly. If you are using many paint colours, it will be good to prepare a painting plan to specify the colour of the paint at each area.

Tiling and wet works As our tiling did not involve many different tiles and intricate design we didn’t prepare a tiling plan. And ooops… there were a few hiccups during the tiling process. Master bathroom Mosaics in master bathroom were laid at the wrong area. It was supposed to be laid at the shower area instead of the bathtub area. Our contractor rectified this promptly. We like the idea of a ledge at the shower area for shower gel and shampoo. Looking forward to soaking in the bathtub. Common bathroom Our contractor called to ask about the colour of the grout for various areas but missed out on the grout for the common bathroom wall tiles. The colour of the wall tile is beige and we had wanted the grout to be in beige. Instead, white grout was used. We asked our contractor if this could be rectified and our contractor said beige grout could be applied over the white grout. However, this wasn’t done after a few days. We decided to let it slide as we thought there was not much difference between white grout and beige grout. Hope this wouldn't bug us later. For the shower area, we prefer a drop rather than a kerb. Kitchen We had wanted glass backsplash at the kitchen and this was provided for in the quote. However, our contractor did a subway tile backsplash for us. We didn’t ask for rectification as the subway tiles backsplash looked good. We also asked our contractor to construct a cement sink support. Living Our white brick feature wall. As we want to mount our TV on the brick wall, our contractor drilled holes on the wall for the cables to pass through. To avoid any hiccup, it will be good to prepare a tiling plan to specify which tiles are to be laid at each area, how the tiles are to be laid and the colour of the grout. We are satisfied with the workmanship. The tiles are aligned and neatly laid, the grout lines are even and we didn’t find any hollowness when knocking on the tiles. Only complaint was that some of the edges and corners are not so well done. Maybe the edges or the walls are not that straight?

Had been busy unpacking the past few days. House is now super messy! . Had also been busy shopping on Amazon. Am thinking whether to buy a rug for the living. Let's continue with the journey shall we... Electrical wiring, piping and aircond trunking This stage was rather boring for me as all I see were wires, pipes and trunkings. Before the start of the electrical work, you will have to think of all the power points you need - besides the bed for bedside lamp, besides the sofa for table or floor lamp, various appliances at the TV console, kitchen countertop, study table, at the dining area for steamboat, CCTV, doorbell etc. You may also want 2-way switches for some lights. We didn’t specify any 2-way switches and was pleasantly surprised that my contractor’s electrician thought about that and installed 2-way switches for the common bathroom (as the common bathroom is accessible from the common room and the passage way) and track lights along the dining area (so that we can have lights while walking to our bedroom). It was only after a few weeks the renovation started that we browsed Renotalk more often and found that our contractor is a rather popular contractor on Renotalk. The reviews are mixed. The mixed reviews did raise some concerns but we decided to keep calm about it as he had been progressing the renovation well. *keeping fingers crossed.

You are more extreme than me as I didn't build any cabinet in the yard

Selection of tiles, laminate and craft stone As we engaged our contractor only a few days before we got our keys to the unit, he brought us to select tiles after completion of the hacking. We went to Hafary and Lian Seng Hin at Balestier. He guided us through the tile selection process and gave us some practical advice. Master bathroom The only place in our house where we used dark colour is the master bathroom. It has a grey theme. Common bathroom We chose beige as the colour scheme for our common bathroom. Kitchen As for the kitchen, we decided to use 3D subway tiles for the walls and beige tiles for our floor. Laminate For the laminate in living, dining and the 3 rooms, we chose Rustic Light Oak from the Berry Alloc Riviera series as we wanted something with light grey wood tone. I was a little worried that the eyes would be very distracting but my hubby said that the eyes made the laminate looked more natural. Ok, will just go along with hubby’s choice. Brick wall Our choice of craft stone for the brick wall. Though brick wall is overused but I really love it. I think it will look very pretty with a TV mounted on it.

Let’s Get the Party Started - Hacking Hacking started soon after we got the keys to our unit. Our contractor Whatsapped us in the morning to inform us that he had started hacking. So excited! Hacking was completed in 2 days. We didn’t visit the unit during hacking and therefore we have no photo of the hacking and the aftermath. The only photo we have was when we visited the unit after the hacking had been completed and the debris cleared. Common bathroom Kitchen Study room The hacking of the walls of the study room made the whole unit looks much bigger and brighter. The walls will be replaced by aluminium framed glass panels.