Overhauling At Marine Terrace

[Shah 0]

Hi everyone!! I've been lurking around this forum ever since my family and I started looking for a new place at the start of 2014. After numerous house viewings and disappointments when our offers were rejected, we finally found an apartment in a neighborhood we love, Marine Parade! This blog will hopefully chronicle the experiences we have throughout the renovation process, as well as offer any tips and lobangs that will help make the journey easier and more affordable.

Firstly, the floor plan!

Typical 4-room layout no?? The flat is in original condition, i.e. ugly green terazzo flooring in the living room and even worse beat-up parquet flooring in the bedrooms. At least there's a utility room for our storage needs. Another problem about this flat is the ultra tiny toilets, whose walls in between can't be hacked as there's multiple pipes along one side in the shower room. Seeing that there are many areas to renovate, we decided to overhaul everything, walls, floors, doors, windows, nothing old will still be left after we're done lol..

Our theme will be rojak . This is because my mom and dad, bro and I have differing styles and tastes, so we decided that we will handle our rooms individually, while the living room and kitchen will be done up in a 'light' industrial style. The living room will have a white brick tv feature wall and black electric trunking, while our kitchen will house a small L-shaped kitchen and our dining area. Here is an amateur preview done using Autodesk Homestyler

This program is a lifesaver as it helped me visualize and play with the layout of the flat. It also helped the IDs/contractors we met see what we actually wanted, which was a practical and simple house, with a hint of design. As we knew what we wanted, we focused on finding contractors to do up the place. The search (we didn't engage a contractor in the end) will be elaborated in a later post, and I hope we made the right choice!

So that's it for the first post! Our 1st appt was in the morning today, and we hope to start renovations in two weeks. Wish us luck!!

[Shah 0]

ID/Contractor Search

As we were looking for budget friendly options to renovate our flat, and as we already knew what we wanted for the look of our place, we focused our search on contractors at the beginning. I have done a lot of reading in this forum and came up with my own rough quote as to the costs of the renovation. This really helped with choosing the right person to help us with the renovation.

Contractor 1- Marie. She arranged a meetup with me after seeing my post on another website. During the meetup I laid out the thorough plans for the apartment, however I sensed that she was mainly a coordinator and not the one who will be totally overseeing the whole reno. After the meetup I hounded her for a quote after 1 week of silence, only to receive naught, so next contender please..

Contractor 2- The famous Alan! It took awhile to arrange an appointment as he is eternally busy but we managed to meet up on one of the days he was free. He told me that he set up TEN appointments for the day so I started being a little wary after that. Alan is a very good listener though, and he gave very good recommendations to the ideas that we have, no outright saying that can't be done or it will not look good. He promised us a quote in 3 days, and when that passed I messaged him to remind him of his promise, which he did fulfill the night itself. His quote is very thorough, and included all costs such as electrical and plumbing. However, his quote was 10K above our budget, with some parts of the reno not included, so we shelved him in view of other IDs/contractors.

ID/Contractor 3- Joey. I found them through one of the popular threads here in rt. Arranged for an appointment at their showroom in Balestier which looked very good and professional. The boss handed me to Joey who discussed with me our plans for the flat, and they were very attentive and detailed, even showing me one part of the reno that could be left out as we were using the utility room for storage and didn't need anything to be done. Their quote came on time which was good but it was 12K above our budget which was hard to justify so we were sad to let them go.

ID 4- Getty. Looking through reno companies online brought out this company which offered affordable packages for their reno so we decided to arrange an appointment even tho their showroom is in Sembawang. When I was there I was handed over to Getty who is very nice and laidback, much to my liking. After laying out all that's needed for the flat, he was the only one who asked for our budget and told us outright that we can't get what we want for the amount we wanted to pay. Even so, he promised us a quote in a few days.

The first quote came out to be under our budget which surprised us, but some parts of the reno was missing so we arranged for another meetup to discuss our plans again, and when the 2nd quote was received we were fine with the increase in budget. My brother and I who are in charge of the reno process also felt a bit of chemistry with Getty that we didn't get from the others, so we decided to go all in with Getty for our reno

Sometimes I wonder whether we didn't go through enough contractors or IDs to get a more informed choice but I believe if you can click with the person you're working with, and the budget is right, go for it. I won't be giving out his company and contact details until the end of the reno as I can only recommend a person if he has showed himself to be highly capable so let's hope for the best ok!

Edited July 14, 2014 by Shah

[Shah 0]

Home Furnishings

As we have some items in our current home that is still relatively new such as TVs, washing machines, fridge and beds, we can cut down on our already growing costs. Still, many items have to be purchased such as lights, sofa and dining furniture so here's a list of items we're planning to buy.

Sofa: Still looking!! We need a sofa that's 3-seater, fabric, and somewhat fits our theme. Any lobangs?

Dining table: Its either

The right one will have a white table top instead of black. Left table is from nookandcranny.sg while right is from Comfort Design.

Dining chairs: We're getting Eames chairs. Was supposed to buy from taobao but we found the chairs being sold at $50 at Star Living and Lorenzo so that's settled.

Hob/Hood: After looking at multiple stores in Geylang and Jalan Besar, we found a treasure at Heritage Bathroom Gallery. They're very helpful and knowledgeable, and give humungous discounts that make them cheaper than their competitors by a lot. Highly recommended. As our kitchen is small, we decided to get a 60cm Teka hob and EF hood.

Fans: Getting from Heritage too. Fanco FFM-4000 with LED lightkit and Elmark Aeratron fan

Taobao Wishlist

Thanks to all the renotalkers for sharing their experiences on how to shop and ship products from taobao, and giving credibility to this avenue for getting our home products. I've spent countless hours going through multiple shops and links to find items that will cost double or even more if I purchased it here. One more thing, as you can see from my nick, I don't speak or read mandarin at all so without the help of people here and google translate, we would have missed out on such amazing deals.

Armchair and coffee table: Translating armchair into mandarin and trying to find what we want was exhausting. Thank goodness we found this cool armchair. The coffee table will inject warmth into our raw space too

http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a1z10.3.w4011-5565104318.108.4msZbC&id=37256938959&rn=b2ad257cfabf24fcacbb949e596e1dd5

http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.375.BI7pRq&id=37935717999

Lights: Almost all our lights will be from taobao.

1. Bedroom light http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a1z10.3.w4011-3444722181.290.VC7YE7&id=25026048957&rn=a2a5a9393d394f660bf06e3474f0b09e

2. Kitchen LED ceiling light http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a1z10.3.w4011-3326574204.106.W7c8km&id=35305091261&rn=05744c7a5ff7ea2d525740abc436cec0

3. Dining pendant light http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a1z10.3.w4011-3444722181.111.0k20Bx&id=20780763724&rn=53deacee8cc3b5f0ea83e0203d16ade7

There's still more but I'll leave it for another day

Edited July 3, 2014 by Shah

[eastlovin 1]

Hi fellow MPer! We have just gotten our flat in MP too and are currently in the midst of renovations. Like yours, ours is an old flat in original condition so major overhauling works were required as everything needed to be changed!

We were too busy/lazy to plough through all the useful information in renotalk before we started our own renovation (regret that a bit now!) so we just relied on our parents' advice and experiences from when they did their home revamp a few years earlier LOL. So stressful- I really cannot wait for our renovations to be over, after which I'll start my renovation blog too! In the meantime I'll be parking myself here to lend some support! Good luck with your renovations!

[Songz 132]

Welcome to RT.

Hope to see more update esp the current house state

(*Terrazzo flooring is actually 1 of the best flooring i feel but some may not be able to accept the design though)

[Shah 0]

Hi songz and eastlovin thanks for all your words of support. Sorry I've been mia the past week, had a close friend's wedding in vietnam and was away. Updates will come soon!

Eastlovin I can't wait to see your tblog. Is yours a 3/4 or 5 room flat? I don't really see many resale MPers here lol..

[eastlovin 1]

Hi Shah- yes agreed that there are not many resale MPers here so decided to come lend some support when I saw your tblog lol Mine is also a 4 room flat! Looking forward to the updates!

[Shah 0]

Hi guys I just updated our ID search in the post above. Wow eastlovin I can't wait to read your blog and see what you guys did to a similar apartment too! I hope everything is going smoothly on your side .

Songz the terrazzo flooring is nice and retro but it totally didn't fit in with our theme, and my parents weren't feeling the floor as well hahaha.

Design Ideas & Our Plans

Living room

My family really likes the industrial look for our living space so we decided to look through multiples magazines for inspiration for our living room. We didn't want to go all out as we believed the place will look cold so we decided on some industrial accents instead. Our floors will use homogenous tiles that look like concrete screed as we believe it will be easier to maintain when compared to a completely concrete floor.

A white brick wall is also a must for us as we love the textured look it will bring to the space. Instead of doing a full wall, we're going for a brick tv feature wall as it will reduce costs and future cleaning chores (mostly done by me ). We will also use black trunking to conceal our wires because we love the look too. We were somewhat inspired by the pics below, but we want to create a nicer brick look using craftbricks and will have a suspended console as well.

Kitchen

Due to the large size of old flat's kitchens we decided to divide the space into a kitchen and dining area. We will have a small 11 feet L-shaped kitchen with wooden laminate base and glossy white laminate top. Our ID managed to get us granite countertops at an affordable price and we will be putting a white tempered glass backsplash. Hopefully it will look something like the pic below (without the pull-out table).

WC/Bathroom

The most problematic part of the reno process is the 2 ultra small bathrooms. As it's an old flat it comes with a separate WC and shower area. Firstly we wanted to break down the walls between two, but when that was impossible we decided to leave it as is and renovate it to look as nice as humanly possible lol. In the WC we'll be installing a small wash basin as it allows a person to complete his 'business' there (icluding washing his hands) while the bathroom will be seperated into a shower area and a wash basin area using a small glass panel.

Another problem of the bathroom is the unsightly pipes that run through on one side of the wall which we wanted to box up, but this was rejected by our ID as it was not possible to box it up using anything other than glass, so painting the pipes is all we can do .

Bedrooms

As written before, we already have our beds from our current place which we bought 3 years ago. We also wanted to inject our own personalities into our own rooms, so the only reno we're doing in the rooms would be to change the flooring to laminate floors and to have built-in cabinets for all rooms. Does anyone have any reviews on Supreme Floors? Cos that's the brand our ID is gonna use.

I can't speak for my brother and my parents as to what the wanna do to their rooms but I can share what I want with mine . After reading greglhc's blog I was really enamoured with a dark turquoise wall for my room while the other walls will be painted white. After searching the net I decided to have a similar looking wall like those below.

Don't they look amazing? As my bed doesn't have a headboard i plan to create a visual headboard like the pic on the left using framed pictures, artwork, clocks and mirrors too i think. I also plan to put a hanging industrial lamp beside my bed to create a reading area. I'll be purchasing the chair on the right from taobao to use either as my desk chair or a reading chair beside my bed.

Can't wait to start reno!

[LHWH 7]

Hi shah can you share the link for the white tb chair? Thank you!

[Troublemaker 31]

I have phobia of things hanging on the wall where my bed is. I am scared that they will drop when I am sleeping...

But the idea is cool...

[Shah 0]

Hi shah can you share the link for the white tb chair? Thank you!

Hi LHWH the link is

http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=14025232958&ali_refid=a3_420434_1006:1104720608:6:%D2%CE:7b3bd883c321f8458d8e56bde22217f5&ali_trackid=1_7b3bd883c321f8458d8e56bde22217f5&spm=a230r.1.17.36.UJu61o

They have it in black too! I plan to bring it to an upholsterer to create a more comfortable seat cushion so that i can sit on it the whole day

I have phobia of things hanging on the wall where my bed is. I am scared that they will drop when I am sleeping...

But the idea is cool...

Ooo I've never really thought about that. Time to think about how to ensure they don't fall then lol. I really love the colour of your living room Troublemaker

[Brian Huang 4]

Congrats on your new place! So for the 4 room layout there's only 1 toilet? The kitchen looks really spacious!

[Troublemaker 31]

My living room colour? Ahahaha... Its mostly girls who appreciate that cheerful color! ahahaha... You have Good Taste!

Kaypoh a bit... I was browsing fortytwo website and found chairs similar to your tb chair.

http://www.fortytwo.sg/living-room/seating/chairs-lounges.html

[Shah 0]

Congrats on your new place! So for the 4 room layout there's only 1 toilet? The kitchen looks really spacious!

Thanks forgot2bme That's the drawback of old flats in Marine Parade and other areas, 1 miniscule toilet. However, most of the time it'll just be my brother and I in the flat so we'll make do, and as both the WC and bathroom are separate there's lesser opportunities for any hogging of toilet during 'emergency' situations lol.

And yeah old flats' kitchens are enormous. We actually wanted to get a resale 3 room flat and hack the walls to create one long open space, but this flat works too as our kitchen area will be small enough to put our dining area there as well.

My living room colour? Ahahaha... Its mostly girls who appreciate that cheerful color! ahahaha... You have Good Taste!

Kaypoh a bit... I was browsing fortytwo website and found chairs similar to your tb chair.

http://www.fortytwo.sg/living-room/seating/chairs-lounges.html

Haha true that.. I like how lively and bright it makes the living room feel, but personally I'll be crucified if I pick that colour for any of our rooms .

Thanks for sharing with me the link. Are you talking about the dining or bedroom chair? I'm getting that bedroom chair cos I've never seen it before in any of the shops here. Hopefully it matches with my somewhat eclectic/industrial room.

[NatashaNBhagchandani 0]

Hi Shah,

Finally manage to find someone who understand the problems with marine parade homes. I have lived here for about 9 years and decide to do exactly what you did. The biggest problem is really the toilet. I would really love if you could share the pictures of your home now. Different parts of the home . Who did you finally go with , the contractor. Maybe an estimate of your renovation cost too. I am still at initial stage of designing etc. Budget is not too big but adequate. Any advice would be great.

Thanks Nat