Design for Kelana Jaya

Today, I'm putting up makeover pictures of a sub-sale unit. There are 2 major areas to renovate for any sub-sale property - the kitchen and the bathroom. However good condition the property is in, the kitchen and bathroom tiles will definitely be out of trend if the property is a few years old - yes, colours have trends and trends change every few years.



Again I must emphasize that to make the home beautiful takes much more than just the amount of money spent on the renovation work. The result of every work delivered depends a lot on the effort that the home owner contributes too. In this case, he has done a superb job in shopping for the MATCHING SOFT FURNISHINGS and keeping the home NEAT. I had written earlier on what makes a good renovation result at http://meridiandesign.blogspot.com/2009/05/you-are-wasting-your-time-and-money-if.html

The Living Room
This unit is quite a large and long one. Frequently this type of layout will be rather dark in the centre where the sun doesn't come in. Furthermore this balcony opening faces North, so there is no direct sunlight. To bring in the natural sun, avoid putting up heavy drapes but use sheer ones instead. The owner has indicated his preference for earthy and cozy colours - colours that relaxes you at the end of a busy workday. I used a mixture of Nippon Terrace Stone and Bramble Beige on smaller walls - greyish organic greens, earthy enough without too much brown and a little green because green is a calming and relaxing colour. The rest of the house is in Daisy White.
Tips :
There are many new shades of white available nowadays, just make sure not to choose lily white, apple white, lilac white, barley white, etc if you what something different. I normally do not use Pearl Glo paints unless the customer specially requests for it because
1) glossy walls are not trendy
2) glossy surfaces brings out all the flaws in the wall - never choose this unless your walls are fully skim-coated.

The Open Kitchen

The original kitchen was a closed up one with a hole opening, as was the trend a few years ago. We updated the look be opening it up and covering all the walls in glass, hence removing the need to change all the tiles. I proposed a combination of glossy black and wood grains. Black is a strong and sombre colour, to add brown wood grains would make it friendlier to live with. Unless the set is very small, it's always better to have a combination of 2 materials and colours.

The Guest Bathroom

The common bathroom was completely made over. The very outdated blue tiles were removed, new cream ones plus some very large mock stone pieces put up.

TIPS :

A point to note here, when buying tiles be careful of not getting lower grade tiles which are cheaper but the sizes will not be equally same. Also, buy tiles from the same batch so that all the colours are even. Always buy around 3-5% extra so that in cases of miscalculation or breakage, the workflow is not interrupted. Do not immediately buy the toilet bowl until the plumber can confirm the outlet piping size, otherwise you'll end up with a toilet bowl that cannot be fitted in.

The plaster ceiling of the master bedroom is in 2 levels, providing some depth. We did a fake wall on the left side of the wardrobe to give it a built-in impression. This method may waste a little space and cost a little higher but the result is always much nicer than using an end panel.

This view from the balcony captivated my colleagues from Sibu, Sarawak when they accompanied me to this unit during the renovation work. They do not have such a high look-out point back home.

The total renovation costs for this home is as follows :

Convert closed-up to open concept kitchen
and kitchen cabinets - RM17,500
Master bedroom wardrobe - RM6,600
MBR bath renovation - RM3,500

Common bath renovation - RM7,600
Skim coat and Painting to ceiling, wall and doors - RM6,800
MS grille - RM1,200
Electrical, plaster board, misc. - RM9,600

Curtains - RM4,900

Total renovation costs RM57,700