Love Nest @ Casa

[originalbread 0]

Your house looks so nice... Like this also got negative comments, really all sorts of people with all sorts of views... but the brick wall part was really funny... i wanted to do brick wall too, but scared hard to clean, and I'm so lazy...

Haha I think i know all the possible comments you will received and ya lo how come they never realised that we made our choice knowingly. U exact same theory with me!! Haha rather nice and last 5 yrs than ugly and last forever haha. DIYing the mosaic grout again is not that difficult, you can do it every yr to renew it..

But ur brick wall comment is funny !! Plain concrete wall not hard meh? If ur kids really like to bang the wall even normal wall they also will go bang.. Nowadays kids are so smart, they have good sense of judgement for obstacles.

Yup during house warming I guess we really need to adopt selective listening technique!

But still I feel overall should be good comments, I have the confident...

Edited July 14, 2012 by originalbread

[theitsybits 0]

Hi hi,

Your home design looks really nice!

I really like the idea of wood looking tiles, may I know which company do you buy from? and the colour code of your tiles?

how do you find your tiler's work? can you PM me the contact for your contractor and tiler? And can kindly share the cost of labour? Thank you!

Hello,

We got the tiles from Soon Bee Huat. They were $2.60psf before gst..

i have no complaints about my tiler contractor, he has been very responsive, very responsible and everything has been very smooth..even when there's minor rectification needed he does it for us..neighbors who visited our place has commented that my grouts are very narrow and tiles are laid very nicely..

but one thing about such tiles my way, the floor will not be entirely even/flat as the tiles itself is not straight (abit warped)..it will be less obvious if you lay it staggered or aligned..i guess you can avoid this problem by buying more expensive tiles ($9psf kind) as those are not made in china and is generally straighter..

[theitsybits 0]

Hi, I'm also from Casa. Now having aircon problem...

Could you advise how your contractor got the Mitsubishi inverter sys 4 out of MBR aircon window?

One aircon contractor insists that even Mitsubishi/Daikin sys 3 cannot go out of the window due to opening height....(mine is about 69cmH)

I don't really want to get non-inverters or system 2 or other brands.

Any info/help would be greatly appreciated.

yes, they will dismantle to get it out of the window..i went to hong liang because i know that he has done quite a few casa units and knows how to do it..i'm okay with it, as long as it's not gain city people doing it as i've heard many horror stories about them..i prefer to go to smaller shops who has a team of experienced workers..

i guess it's up to you..some people are not comfortable about it and get other brands or the heavy industry one..HTHs!

[theitsybits 0]

Thanks! Hope you find your dream bed soon. I saw one at Grafunkt, can't remember if the headboard is straight or curved, they had one without headboard. But I was trying not to react too much when they told me the price tag.

I don't understand why so hard to find nice and affordable beds in Singapore. the ones that usually come with the mattresses usually so ugly. I like the classic looking headboard like these and these. but I gave up trying to find in Singapore. Even if I find it, its going to cost a bomb.

thanks for the pm on the contractor. Hope your carpentry issues get resolved soon.

i like grafunkt stuff, but they are really really expensive......

and yes, i like those classic headboards, but seriously, nothing catches my eye here..we're totally not into the frames that come with bed..

*sigh! i guess we'll keep looking or sleep on the mattress for the time being..it's not so bad since it's 36cm high..if really no choice, may consider custom making it at Lorgans but it's not cheap either..

Your house looks so nice... Like this also got negative comments, really all sorts of people with all sorts of views... but the brick wall part was really funny... i wanted to do brick wall too, but scared hard to clean, and I'm so lazy...

haha i'm braced for more negative comments to come..i haven't even have my housewarming!

i guess it's true that white kitchen and brick walls are harder to maintain..but my motto is, all beautiful things require more maintenance than anything less beautiful..women included.. so if i want my place to look beautiful, i'm prepared to put in abit more work lo.. can't have the best of both worlds..

[theitsybits 0]

Day 41

the carpenter FINALLY came to take measurements today, more than 2 weeks after we informed them that measurements could be taken..first week was spent taking initial measurements (not by carpenter) and finalizing designs and choosing laminates..

it has been a very frustrating week, because the carpenter was scheduled to come 'early this week'..but after chasing the whole week by phone and email for a update, simply no response..till late last night, after a nasty email and threatening to change a carpenter, we were finally told that the carpenter is coming to measure today afternoon..

we have informed them of the schedule since June, telling them to come for measurement end of June, and we expect carpentry to be up by end of July..so far, no confirmation that carpentry can meet deadline, and none of our emails and queries were replied.. all i can say is, it's a pain working like this and has made the final part of our otherwise very smooth renovation very unpleasant. is this normal? working with K has been so smooth and he responds very quickly within the hour or two, and i'm really not used to not having any updates and not having any responds.

and they still came and nit pick on my not-yet-completed-painting and comment that my contractor is 'lazy' as he did not come to install lights yet..we actually agreed that he can come after carpentry is up, since some switches were to be concealed into carpentry and our kitchen requires lights too..it's quite pointless to make K come down to do up half the light when there's nothing else we can do with our house without carpentry! that coming from someone who has not been responding and have been dragging things

moreover, reviews of them has been bad..and we can only hope that they'll do a decent job and deliver by the end of July.. only time will tell..

a kind advice to all: do avoid using your relative as much as possible to avoid complications and problems..i have read so many people advising against that, yet we conceded since MIL was very insistent..we made that mistake and have been paying for it now..if we had gone ahead to let K do the whole job, we would have saved a lot of time, a lot of frustrations, a lot of unhappiness and would have had a completely renovated house by now.. and instead of doing self-reflection, they are trying to nit-pick on K now..

Edited July 14, 2012 by theitsybits

[casa 0]

O sorry to learn about it nevertheless cool down and relax

Hope u able to settle your capentry issue asap

Can't wait to c your carpentry works

[theitsybits 0]

O sorry to learn about it nevertheless cool down and relax

Hope u able to settle your capentry issue asap

Can't wait to c your carpentry works

thanks thanks..we will get there..only a matter of when..and how..

[theitsybits 0]

Week 6 concluded

Progress is slow this week. Chemical cleaning was done, 2 toilet doors and service yard windows were fixed. Carpenter (not K) finally came for measurements.

Loving the big open space in the living/dining/kitchen area where guests will mingle. Service yard window is up.

Main focus of this week is the toilet doors. I love them, and they ain't cheap since we chose solid wood over PD and bi-fold doors. I dislike the look and feel of PD and bi-fold door since they're usually quite flimsy and made of PVC which kind of spoils the look of the place..

Changed the MBR toilet door to a 2-panel one as toilet is too small..the original door opened up to hit the sink/vanity top, and you can't really brush your teeth without knocking your elbows if you do not close the doors.

The 2-panel sliding door for the huge common bathroom.

View of the huge common bathroom. We are still waiting for the louvre bi-fold door to be installed for this door. As we are getting a full-length vanity, the door has to open outwards, and we paid more for a louvre door because it looks better than normal bi-fold door. Not much choices of doors due to space constraints..

And here's the corridor of doors. All our doors are white now. I love how the doors match the grey walls and enhance the feel of the place.

Now all we can do is wait for carpentry to be up to finish up renovation. It's been a really tiring journey and I'm really hoping that it can end soon.

[domurai 0]

Good luck on your carpentry, I'm getting tired deciding a contractor. I dropped you a PM hope you can provide contact for your contractor.

[innerlight 0]

Hi theitsybits, wah! Your place is looking good , Can you come and do mine too? Our thinking on the bathroom doors are quite similar! I was thinking of white louvre sliding doors and sliding glass doors and was surfing for some door designs online. Yea, the pd louvre doors might feel flimsy. I'm just worried abt the sliding mechanism by yr 3 and after...

[oqs 0]

Hi! I'm from Casa Clementi and doing my renovations now too. Can I know where did you get the solid wood 2-leaf doors from and how much??

And at risk of sounding repetitive, I still got to say, nice place! I can understand it's a tiring journey, but persevere and you will be able to see the fruits of your labour soon. Cheers!

Edited July 16, 2012 by oqs

[theitsybits 0]

Hi! I'm from Casa Clementi and doing my renovations now too. Can I know where did you get the solid wood 2-leaf doors from and how much??

And at risk of sounding repetitive, I still got to say, nice place! I can understand it's a tiring journey, but persevere and you will be able to see the fruits of your labour soon. Cheers!

hello neighbor!

thank you for the kind words..

everything was from our contractor..we just showed him pictures of it and he helped us get it..i think most contractors/IDs should have it? just need to show them pictures?

They will take measurements and customize the size..we requested for the joints to be 'female and male' to ensure that there's no gap between the doors..i think they are nyatoh wood, painted, and cost us something around 600-800? can't really remember, but it's quite abit more expensive than bi-fold doors which would cost about 300-400..

[AlisaWu 4]

hey~ love your reno ..

was also thinking of doing the wooden floor with the seamless look across all the rooms, but for more of a Japanese style (didn't even know they got tile version until i saw your blog, way cool then dun have to worry about using too much water for mopping )..

can share with me your contractor contact and reno quote to look-see?

tia

also, you hacked 1 of the bedrooms to build a wardrobe for your masterbedroom, that means the wardrobe behind no wall?

then how about the sound traveling to the other room?

i was exploring the idea of hacking the wall between the 2 common bedrooms and building 1 long wardrobe to share (with doors on both side, cannot walk through de, divider in the middle so each side will only have 1/2 the length), but hor, liddat later they wanna disturb the other person sleeping in the other room then go knocking their wardrobe

do you do anything special to the back of your wardrobe?

Edited July 17, 2012 by AlisaWu

[cutebaby20 0]

I like ur flooring as i think to used wood tile for the whole house exlude the toilet only. How many color of flooring tile u used?

Cheers

Cutebaby

Edited July 17, 2012 by cutebaby20

[theitsybits 0]

Does anyone has issues with malware on this site? I can't post on my laptop!

Alisa: I'm having a bookshelf behind the wardrobe sharing same backing..some ppl use it as a laminated feature wall or use gypsum board to cover it and looks like other walls..your idea should be good and noise should not be an issue since clothes should be a good insulator? It's your own house leh, who will knock on the insides of the wardrobe! Just like knocking on the door mah..

Cutebaby: I'm only using one tile, one color for the whole house including kitchen yard, kitchen and rooms..the toilet came with grey tiles which we did not change..