Our Dream Home @ Woodlands Meadow

[guojiawen 101]

Nights shot...I love lights. Blink the lights few times tonight. Maybe I might see you.

Haha, I am not around to play with the lights. But my ID did capture 2 night shots for my living room!

[guojiawen 101]

Renovation Day 28 - 16 May (Part 1)

My simple lights are up in all rooms! Except for my chandelier (which is still somewhere in China but making its way over real soon).

Down lights for my main door and kitchen entrance

Rooms + kitchen are using the same lights

Both toilets using the same lights

[guojiawen 101]

Renovation Day 28 - 16 May (Part 2)

Night shots for my living room downlights and ceiling fan (in love w our dream house.... )

Angle 1

Angle 2

All my lights are in bright white "daylight" as hubby prefers our house to be bright and somehow feels that "warm lightings" can spoil our eyes if we need to use our computer or read (which is pretty often).

Chose "warmlight" for my ceiling fan when theres a need for ambience. Haha.

Checked with my ID if the lights are all bright enough and he said our living room is super bright. Understand there's readers who asked me how many downlights and how many watts to put in 5 room BTO living room before. So 10x 12W LED daylight downlights should be more than sufficient. My ceiling fan light is only on when needed in the future..

From the pictures at the moment, i can only conclude that the house is super duper white. Love how the ceiling fan looks with all the lights too! When the carpentry comes in, grey will come into picture....

[guojiawen 101]

Kitchen Carpentry Discussions

So apart from pictures of the lights and ceiling fan, my ID also brought up a few minor issues regarding kitchen carpentry which we ironed out yesterday. Glad he brought it up and discussed it with us and not just go ahead with what he thought was best for us. I'm starting to relate this sentence to him - "Final decision up to you". LOL.

Carpentry drawing (hood, hob, fridge side)

I don't understand half the scribblings on the drawing, but i figured those were just dimensions. So only paid attention to where i wanted the casement doors and drawers. This side of the kitchen cabinet was according to what I planned - casement doors below sink and hob + drawers between sink and hob + drawers between hob and fridge.

Carpentry drawing (tall unit side)

Issues #1 and #2 came up on this side of the kitchen carpentry.

Issue #1 - I wanted the top and bottom casement doors of the tall unit to be in line with the kitchen cabinets beside it. And to insert a drawer between the bottom casement door and the built in oven. After measurement, there were only 2 to 3" left between the bottom casement door and built in oven. So the drawer idea got to be scrapped. Hence instead of having both the top and bottom doors flushed with the kitchen cabinets at the side, I will only flush the bottom doors, and the top doors will be slightly longer.

Issue #2 - Number of drawers. For those who have read through my tblog, i catered for 8 drawers on this side (thinking back a little naive oops). As can be seen in the carpentry drawing, my ID suggested 4 large (3ft or 0.9m) drawers instead. I took out my measuring tape and went OMG. It's huge. I asked for 8 drawers but ID shared that the drawers will be too small to be used. So I settled for 6 (2ft or 0.6m) drawers in the end as revised below

On a side note, I also catered for 3 layers on both the top and bottom cabinet (based on my parent's kitchen) but based on my kitchen dimensions, there will only be 2 layers top and bottom.

Carpentry drawing side view (tall unit side)

Issue #3 and #4 came up here because I wanted my t5 lights below the top kitchen cabinet.

Issue #3 - Whether to seal up the dotted line and waste about 2" space so that when we open the top cabinet, we will have a flat surface to place our stuff. If we don't seal, when we open up the top cabinet, there will be an uneven shape at the back that was used to cater for the t5 lights. Our conclusion was to seal it up and have a flat surface. Otherwise it may be hard to store things all the way to the back in the future.

Issue #4 - Because of the t5 lights, the built in oven switch, light switch and power sockets (originally to be placed just under the top cabinet) has to be placed lower (not flushed with the top cabinet). Another reason being there will be a tempered glass backing between the top and bottom cabinet, and the tempered glass cannot be cut too near the extreme top or bottom or it may crack easily at those points. But it will turn out pretty out of place if it's in the middle of the glass backing. So my ID came up with the solution below, to place it against the tall unit cabinet and flushed with the top kitchen cabinets which we thought will definitely look better.

So all the kitchen carpentry issues were resolved over skype last night. Didn't even think of all these things at all until Jason brought it up. I guess that's why we pay for IDs. They have to figure out the asthetics + functionality issues of the designs.

Edited May 17, 2014 by guojiawen

[guojiawen 101]

Bomb Shelter Feature Wall Discussions

Last post of the day. Just trying to capture all the decisons made before I forget. Sorry for the spam on a Saturday afternoon!

Just to recap, instead of what was posted in my 3D design, my bomb shelter feature wall will be made of full mirror (as my circuit breaker doors cannot be mirrors due to FS reasons).

ID highlighted the L shape at the edge of the bomb shelter wall area (circled) and asked if I want the bomb shelter feature wall to go all the way to the end (he will cut the L shape for the mirror feature wall in that case). He shared that going all the way to the end will look nicer and we agreed. So it will extend all the way, but there will be a L shape at the top to cater for the ceiling beam.

Aside from that, he also highlighted to use that the bomb shelter feature wall thickness will cover the kitchen entrance area by a few inches. From the living room, there won't be an issue as the tempered glass kitchen door will be in line with the feature wall. However, when we look from the kitchen out to the living room, we will see a few inches of the laminates of the feature wall beside the tempered glass door. We noted and accepted it as we doubt there can be a way around it. As along as there's no gaps between the tempered glass door and bomb shelter feature wall, we are alright with it.

Finally! There's also the issue of joining all the mirror panels together. There will be one panel placed horizontally on the top, and three panels vertically. One panel covers the bomb shelter door, and the other two are at the two sides of the door. ID assured that mirror to mirror joint lines won't be obvious. But the joint lines between the three vertical panels will be more obvious, since we need to be able to open the middle panel to access our bomb shelter. Plus the two vertical panels beside the bomb shelter door are of unequal width. There's nothing we can do about it as it's the structure of the bomb shelter. Just crossing my fingers it won't turn out weird.

Okay, finally finished documenting the issues highlighted and decisions made!

Hope the things shared are helpful for home owners who are looking at doing the same stuff.

If you guys can think of any better solutions for the highlighted issues, especially the mirrored feature wall for bomb shelter, please do share with us! Will be really grateful

[4ddd 18]

Your questions super chim...and your house is super white!

Lol...lets see how your ID solved. This is the value.

[SeanLai 0]

Hi,

Do you mind to share your ID detail with me?

My email add. is wklai78@yahoo.com?

Great thanks!!

[meadowbreeze 0]

Hi ,

Congrats to your new home ,

Do you mind send me your detailed quote and ID contact ?

Thanks in advance !

Leng

[guojiawen 101]

Your questions super chim...and your house is super white!

Lol...lets see how your ID solved. This is the value.

Haha, maybe I not good in expressing the issues. Hard to visualise without pictures =p

Hi,

Do you mind to share your ID detail with me?

My email add. is wklai78@yahoo.com?

Great thanks!!

Mailed!

Hi ,

Congrats to your new home ,

Do you mind send me your detailed quote and ID contact ?

Thanks in advance !

Leng

PM-ed

[guojiawen 101]

EDIT: SOLD TO MYSELF Samsung Ezon SHS-1321 Digital Doorlock

Helping OceanEleven with his sales advert that can be found here.

I find it a very cool device to own at home and was really tempted to just get it when O11 posted it. But alas, my hubby, who has been really okay with whatever decisions i made for the house reno so far, was firmly against me buying

For those who don't like to carry keys with you or find it a hassle to dig out keys to open your door when you get home, this little tech device may be just the solution for you!

I will also work hard to convince my hubby for our second home

"Selling the following Samsung Digital Lock at cost. Brand new in box, unopened.

Samsung Ezon SHS-1321 digital door / lock / doorlock / ( SHS-1320 ) 2 RFID cards and 2 RFID sticker cards.

Comes with additional 2 RFID Card hence the higher cost (Total 4)

Price at cost : SGD142.50 (Receipt for proof available)

Reason for selling, decided to go for another model.

Keen party please PM Ocean Eleven directly. Thank you."

Edited May 23, 2014 by guojiawen

[guojiawen 101]

Need Opinions for Bomb Shelter Feature Wall

I have been thinking about my mirrored bomb shelter feature wall and am still wondering if I should go according to my original 3D drawing, or to be totally mirrored.

This is the original 3D drawing. With this design, the lines to the tic tac door won't be obvious. Thinking to hide a pane of mirror inside the tic tac door so if I want to, can always open the door to check myself before heading out.

This is the "example" of totally mirrored feature wall. There will be 4 mirror panes in total. The joint lines between the top pane and bottom 3 vertical panes will not be obvious, but the joint lines between the three vertical mirror panes will be obvious.

Need additional opinions Anyone?

[icexazure 0]

Hi,

Can email me your contractor contact and quotation breakdown please azure_skies7@hotmail.com

TIA~!

[alfredt 27]

i am a mirror person. Makes rooms look bigger.

I vote for the mirror panes.

(but need to be diligent in cleaning fingerprints off mirrors)

[4ddd 18]

Just fixed my Yale fingerprint lock today... It's cool!

Will prefer non mirrored as I was thinking mirror may look eerie at night.

[Harriette 42]

Hi Jiawen,

I refer to your post on the T5 light for your kitchen cabinets. How many light points are there for your T5 lights?

I also installed T5 lights below my top Ikea kitchen cabinet. If you have only one light point, your internal casing will look like the photo below. It is very little, so I don't think you need to worry about it. To see the real thing, visit Ikea.

image by Harriette_Tan, on Flickr

image by Harriette_Tan, on Flickr

My top kitchen cabinets come in 2 heights, so I have more casing. Still, it doesn't make it difficult to store things.

image by Harriette_Tan, on Flickr

image by Harriette_Tan, on Flickr