Starryun

DIY Project 1 We’ll be doing a few DIY stuffs for the house and this one is the first one! All along the hubby to be wanted a floating platform bed frame for our bed. Such bedframe looks kinda suspended in the air which he thinks it looks totally awesome. These are the examples of floating platform bed. Asked around for a few quotes and he decided to do his own floating platform bed after all the carpenters gave us a 4 figure quote. I tried to ask one carpenter myself and they quoted me price starts from 2.2k. Super -.- . He then started to go figure out how to get that done and got all the materials and tadah~ we got a floating platform bed frame at a fraction of what we were quoted! Our carpenter will help us to stick the laminate at the side of the bed frame so that everything will look more refined. We'll put LED strip around the bed to create the feel similar like the pics above.

Door Selection We went to Yontat a total of 3 times just to get all the door stuffs done. The first time we went was to see see look look and asked for a quotation for 4 plain classic hollow doors for the rooms and walk in wardrobe and lookout for the veneer we want for the main door in case we need to change. The second time we went was to confirm the doors for the rooms. All along getting a main door was not a priority as the previous door was not in a too bad state when we took over the house. We were thinking maybe we could just refurbish it abit and it will look machiam all new. But the poor door’s condition got worse during the wet works. When we had the new tiling done, the door was abit too low and we had to saw the bottom off abit so that the tiles will not be scratched. We had to say bye bye to the main door. This is the first choice of veneer for the main door back then: Then when I knew we have to change the door, I went to source for a digital door lock. We’re more inclined to Samsung’s digital lock but Singapore was selling the P718/P728 at about 1 – 1.1K. Its even more expensive than my fire rated main door. Then a friend recommended me to get an export set and so I got it slightly lesser than 50% of what is sold in SG. However, they only have the gold version for export set. It's still super worth So…the gold digital lock and the veneer that we chose back then doesn’t seemed to match and we went for the 3rd time to choose a veneer that matches the gold digital lock.. and tahdah! That’s our new door! Door before installing the digital lock: Door after installing the digital lock: We’re doing the track doors for the master bedroom entrance and the entrance into the walk in wardrobe. Opted for this so that the doors don’t hinder the switches and its somehow looks more pleasing this way together with the walk in wardrobe door. Pardon the painting of the doors as we've only painted the base coat..the white paint layer not done yet. Track doors opened: Track doors closed: We imported 2 doorframes that will ultimately have a flush finish with the wall or looking frameless. This is one of the doors that supposed we’re making to have a flush finish. This door is a pull out door and the other is a push in door. However, I only have the pull out door pic. We only had the base coat done so the finishing is still not in the desired state and colour.

Carpentry Day 4 & 5 The carpentry work has entered into its 4th sand 5th day. Progress is good by the end of Day 4. The island’s formica has been glued! The formica for the front panels of the tall cabinets by the windos are up as well. The cabinet doors of the cooking and laundry area installed. The cement board on the wall has been installed too. The cabinet to cover the MCB and shelfing for shoes done and also a narrower shoe shelfing installed too! Went over during lunch time and I think their work for the day is to clean up the interiors of the WIW and seal the gaps with silicon.

Hi, We have not used both items so can't really comment much about the quality. The sink doesnt look bad, just a little lighter than and the kitchen sink that we got in SG. It's graded as 304 stainless steel. As for the table, its probably still in china. Got it through ezbuy..slow like mad. Link for the sink: https://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?id=27407184816&toSite=main Link for the table: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=530687146101&toSite=main

Contractors / IDs I noticed that I’m probably the only that is not blogging in a sequence. Haha. It dint occur to me to actually blogged about it until one fine day when I was researching stuffs for the upcoming renovation back then and I chanced upon the T-blog. After we confirmed the deal with the previous own of our flat, we immediately bought the floor plan from hdb as the one that the owner’s agent provide doesn’t seems to be to scale. It’s the hand drawn kinda floorplan: My fiancé then get to work on the design of the house. My basic idea of the house is that the place must be bright, no dark looking house. So he worked according to the layout of the house and what we can afford to. Though the fiancé is working in the industry, but most of his contacts deals with high end projects thus affordability becomes a problem. We then started researching, googling, friend’s contacts for contractors and IDs. These are the few contractors/IDs that we have visited with our design and scope of works required from them: 1) Diamon’ Tif They are the first contractor company we visited. They were running a Christmas promo. What attracted us over was the promo that they have. As we have a long kitchen and having island in mind, carpentry cost will be one of the bulk of the reno cost. The promotion that they were having was that the kitchen cabinet cost $70 pfr. They have their own in house carpentry and they give 5 years warranty instead of the usual 1 or 2 yrs in the industry. However, as usual like what most IDs do, the $70 is limited to a certain length, which is usually 10 ft top and bottom. We sat there for about 2 hours explaining what’s required and how to go about achieving the design. About 3 weeks later, their quote came back and it was one of the highest. 2) Taaxa The previous owner’s agent introduced us his own contractor that did the reno for his place. We requested for a meet up since most contractors do that with their potential clients to understand their needs. This contractor dint and just requested us to email our requirements. His price was almost 30k more than Diamon’Tif! We will probably spit out anything in our mouth upon seeing the quotation. Of course, there wasn’t any purpose to really do a meetup anymore. 3) Renoguyz We went to see him after reading reviews of him being one of the most reasonably priced contractor in the market. He’s one of the last few contractors we met. Having some experiences with previous contractors and ID firms, we realised that they can take a pretty long time to calculate how much profit they should earn. Nick is very efficient. He’s able to quote every item immediately on his pc after we go through the specifications. The quotation is on our hands before we left. We’re actually very impressed no matter what his price is. I guess everyone that went to him somehow or another suffered from his bluntness and sarcasm. The first comment from him after my fiancé intro himself was… People like u all very hard to manage one. Hahahaha! We dint use him ultimately, but should anyone asked for contacts, we’ll be glad to recommend him. 4) D Trend Interior Design We visited them one weekend and had a discussion for an hour or so….but their quote never came back at all. Not recommendable at all. 5) Hoong Fatt Heng Reno Marco was the one that attended to us. He tried his best to give us his best quote as possible though there are certain works he’s not able to go as low. We have since recommend him to some of our friends as well. When we approached him, they are still not GST registered yet. GST in reno is a horrifying figure. The amount is enough for you to do a lot a lot of other works. 6) SW Contruction A close friend recommended us to him. Very close to what we want (probably a lot of “friendship price”) but the only thing is they are GST registered. With that, they actually lose out the opportunity. Ultimately, we chose to be our own main con and coordinate everything ourselves. It's really not easy to manage some stuffs and people should you choose to be ur own main con. Our home that definitely has our sweat and blood!

Carpentry Day 2 & 3: After Day 1's installation of the cabinets to the corners each belongs to. The carpentry work on Day 2 and 3 has been rather consistent. Walk in wardrobe The walk in wardrobe was in place at the end of Day 2 and completed by Day 3. The uncle in Day 2 was sticking the PVC on the top edge of the walk in wardrobe when i reach my new place after work. It was all done on Day 3! The fiance took out his jeans to try on the height of the trousers rack. LOL. Kitchen Island The half the island was up on Day 2 when i visited after work and the second half up at the end of Day 3. The box on top of the half island is the sink counter and the hole for the sink is cut on day 3 noon time. I find the island was abit way too long and we'll be cutting 4 inches away at the end thats nearer to the bedroom side. Cabinets along the windows Eh..Somehow i dint took pics of the progress of the cabinets along the windows on Day 2. Therefore can only show the difference of Day 1 and 3. On Day 3, they are already gluing the matte white laminates on the exteriors of the cabinets. Also they have completed the installation of the top cabinets by the end of Day 3. Cooking area, Laundry Area This is the area where our hood and hob are and at the other side is the laundry area where we have the laundry sink and washing machine inside the cabinet. The raw areas behind will be covered with white tiles when the carpentry is completed. When the carpentry is formed, the shape of the house is more or less visible. We're really looking forward to completion!

Laminate Selection On and off we’ve been discussing about the laminates we gonna have for our kitchen and bedroom carpentry. Most of the carpentry will be using white matte laminates except for the doors of the cabinets. My Fiance liked the Lam Chuan laminate that my mum chose when she got all her kitchen cabinet replaced as this laminate has matching edge band. However, i find the colour abit towards the darker side. Here is how the Lam Chuan’s laminate looks at my mum's place and the product code shown on their site: Then EDL has this new 2016 Collection and we went to take a look at their catalogue. Some laminates look very good but it’s a pity that their grains are too deep. It will take a lot of effort to clean in the future. We selected a few as shown below. Samples were given to us but I think we dint take a pic on those samples so can only grab the image from their online catalogue. The porcelein teak has a green undertone and the white wash oak has a pinky/red undertone. If i remember correctly, i think the fiance commented that the light hipster oak is on the lighter side because he think the kitchen might just look washed out with the white laminates around. In the end, we chose New Teak and New Teak 1. The difference between the two is that one has a mild grain texture the other one is kinda matte. The textured kind will go into the master bedroom carpentry and the matte ones will be in the kitchen. These are the actual laminate pics: Since we have decided to get the laminates from EDL, we are also getting this white matte laminates from them. All exterior carpentry (anything that can be seen except the doors) will be in this white matte laminate called Porcelein. The carpentry is currently going on...hopefully by early next week everything will be done!

Funiture Purchases We’re actually very kiasu homeowners. Some stuffs we bought was way way ahead even before the sale completion of the flat. I remember we bought our mattress during Robinson's black friday sales last year! From Hipvan: We bought all these during the last xmas sale. I got to know Hipvan from the sideads of Facebook with all their interesting cushions pics but I’ve never clicked on them before. Last December we were walking around millennia walk (usually we go there for Harvey norman or Commune), I saw Hipvan’s pop up store. Their shutters were half down already but we saw a sofa that we wanted to try on. So the fiancé bravely walked in and asked if we could briefly try on it. Fiance likes the simplicity and slim legs and I gave my nod for it. We bought it during their xmas online sale: Jervis L-shape sofa and ottoman in Grey: Besides the sofa, we also got these chairs that are so common these days. But its quite a lasting design and it suits our theme. From Comfort Design The Fiance wanted to get a C-shape side table. We wanted to customise it but our carpenter quoted it way too high so we decided to get it from the retail shop. We saw the offers from Comfort Design and decided to take a look at their showroom in Eunos. We bought it as it was a good size and came in some simple black table top. We also got the rocking chairs, compatible with our dining chairs that we got from hipvan on our 2nd visit to the store. From Taobao We bought ½ of the house lights from Taobao. We will be using the LED strip for our light cove which we bought almost one whole big roll from Taobao. The rest of the lights that we got from Taobao will be more of decorative lights for the house. The floor lamp for the living room (as per what is seen in the 3D sketch): The floor lamp and pendant light for the masterbedroom (as per what is seen in the 3D sketch): We bought our laundry sink from Taobao as well. It arrived in a box with wooden crate as shown below. We took out the sink during lunch time as the carpenter needs to open the sink hole for the plumber to install it. The actual product looks very decent and the exterior of the sink is somehow wrapped with some material...which is quite nice to touch. Site pics: Actual product pic: There's one item that takes forever to arrive SG, i think its still awaiting to be shipped out (sigh). It's our coffee table. This type of coffee table is sooooo hard to find in SG! There is just something that we don't like for similar dimensions that we saw in SG. So when we saw this in Taobao, we knew its the one! Now im praying that it arrives with no damage as there is a 5mm of tempered glass on the table top. I will soon blog about our sanitary fixtures purchases and the items we got from ikea =)

Hi KFC1189, Its a walk in type with storage racks.

Hi KFC1189, We are only doing a rainshower in the bathroom, lack of space for bathtub. But the bathtub idea never crossed our mind as it can be difficult at different stage of life (like pregnancy, old age). The storeroom is right behind the walk in wardobe in the second bedroom. We seperated the room by doing up a partition. We're using the same tiles all over the house except for both bathroom and kitchen wall tiles. Will do up a post soon on the tiles and purchases soon! As for the rubbish chute, it is shown in the floor plan provided by hdb but we have no idea if that space was included in the total area. My place is 120sqm =)

Finally, we've entered the last phase of the reno today! Yay~~~ The carpentry carcass came in during the weekend. I think they made at least 7-8 trips for the whole load of carcass to the house. Carpentry Installation: Day 1. We had the master bathroom door (1st door) and shower door (the 2nd door inside) installed last week. We used a u-channel to support the glass shower door instead of building a plint to support the glass so that the shower glass door is a seamless look from the floor to the ceiling.

Hi, Yup, its that model. We have yet to install it, will take some pics probably next week when the electrician comes over to install the lights.

It's been sometime since this was updated as there are simply too much to do when you're your own place "main con". Last weekend, we headed to JB to look for a ceiling fan for the living room. Previously, we saw something we like from Phyllux showroom but we think it was too expensive, so we put that on hold. After much research from the forums and blogs, we decided to head to Tampoi Lightings as they do sell Elmark Fans which is similar to the model we saw from Phyllux previously. Probably its a Saturday, the shop is full of people and therefore no sales person is free to assist us. Since no one is free at that moment, i suggest to walk a few shops down to Starworld Lighting (if i remember the name correctly) to have a look. Then we saw the exact same model that we are looking for! Woohoo~ The fan cost 1100rm, which is about $300 SGD cheaper than what we see over here. Super happy about it! We got an extra shorter bracket for our installation as the original set will come down to be at about 2.1m after installation which we feel its too low for a ceiling fan. The warranty is 3yrs for the motor but we have to bring it back to jb if its spoiled..thats the down part. Other than that...its definitely worth the trip! The packing of the ceiling fan: The blades for this model is said to be made from wood, so they have the wood grains on the blade. We gt it in white so its kind of beige blades with wood grains instead of the usual white plastic kind of blades:

Big space you have!! i like your door grilles. May i know where you got them from and how much does it cost?

Below are some simple 3D sketch perspectives that the boy did for me so that i can visualize on the design. Living Room Kitchen view from living and from dining Master Bedroom

Been long since the first entry as we took a whole month to clear our reno permits with HDB. The reno works started early this month and its progressing slowly. We are doing our own coordination with the respective contractors/vendors so things can get abit slow especially my fiance and myself are working full time so no one is supervising the workers. Hopefully the progress can speed up abit. Progress so far (can be and cannot be seen): Floors leveled (kitchen, balcony) Storeroom hacked and sealed WIW door entry done water pipe laid elect wiring done aircon truncking done today putty on exposed walls 2 common room tiled storage heaters installed Below are some progress that i took a pic of: The long kitchen wall now gone: Kitchen floor leveled and chute area tiled: Master Toilet - Cistern built: Master Toilet - Wall Built, Windows changed: Common Toilet - Cistern Built: The walls for common toilet is built as well but i forgot to take a pic of it. The guys are laying the tiles for this week! Will update again soon!

Hi JohnJohn, the master bedroom is slightly bigger than the WIW room. The planned WIW room is a combination of WIW and a storeroom. If we swop the room, way to access the different areas will be abit weird.

Hi Everyone, We finally collected our keys at the end of March and we hurriedly carried out all the necessary rituals (door opening & 动土) so that technically we have done what we should before Qing Ming festival. Hacking started on last Monday and we are so looking forward to completion and moving into our own place. My fiancé works in the architecture industry so he’s the brainchild of our place’s design. We will only be engaging contractors and doing all the coordination on our own. In order to get me involved and make me have a “we created this place together” feel, he asked for my inputs and we'll be doing some DIYs for our home as well. Our journey starts from here…. Floorplan: Draft design by the fiance: Original condition of the house. Good thing that it’s chui since we will hack everything away: Original condition of Living Room: Original Condition of Hallway to rooms, dining area and kitchen entrance: Original Condition of Kitchen: . Original Condition of Master Toilet: Since we are the one doing all the coordination work, the poor fiance had to do all the measurements and works himself Self measurement indications for the reno contractors: The works has started and all the floor tiles are gone by now. We are currently waiting for the rest of the permit to go thru before further demolition can be carried out. Can't wait!!!!

Hi, I got a resale flat and will be collecting keys next thurs (30/3). Can i do the open door ritual and ritual to start reno on the same day? This is because it will be Qingming after that weekend so it best to avoid starting anything during qingming. Also, the ritual for door opening for resale flat is the same as those said for BTO flats? Would appreciate if anyone can advise me on this =D Thanks!