10/07/20 Inside a lone tradie was working on the stairs, which is apparently all he does. Because we have so much storage, we did not consider under-stair storage, but he gave me some advice about the structural support sections should we consider it one day. It would probably be a good spot to shove all the Xmas & Halloween decorations, or a wine rack, or misbehaving child mwahaha. When I asked whether our stairs were easy to install or hard & he said ours were a little fiddly because of the additional componentry, but also the house design. Surprising given that the shell of the house & the stairs are straight off the catalogue. Having said that, like most things in life, the people designing don’t always consult the people building
12/07/20 Sunday was surprising for 2 reasons: 1) there were some tradies working upstairs sanding & smoothing the plaster joins, and 2) they ignored the “keep off’ signs & barricades for the newly constructed stairs. Maybe something is happening Monday so they couldn’t wait?
13/07/20 Stair person was back finishing off the balustrades – he wasn’t too happy that the other tradies ignored his signs, especially when there was no one working up there today, so begs the question why they came in on the weekend & didn’t just wait for today. When I asked whether it would cause damage he said no, but it means he may need to come back to fix any creaks & groans before handover. Afterwards he added a blue padded runner to protect the stairs for the next few months. The treads & rails will be a dark stain, but the rest (e.g. newels, risers & stringers) painted to match skirting boards. Underside of stairs will be plastered.
Final bit of façade installed under the gabled section
14/07/20 Quite a few little things happening … Final coat of render & colour (Dulux Rampart) went on. Slightly lighter in colour than the render base, almost a white-grey colour. Looks very neat
Someone had come around in the morning to screw down the (previously nailed down) yellow tongue boards upstairs. Even when the boards were nailed down you had to really to jump up & down to hear movement in the boards, but now nothing. Basically they sand and screw down along all the board edges.
Also, all the expansion slots in the brickwork were caulked with a rubber sealant
15/07/20 They finished off the upstairs cornices
16/07/20 Started preparing the the façade & eaves for painting
Also applied a wetshield to all the wet areas, e.g. laundry left & right, main bathroom upstairs
Later in the day they also started putting a couple of coats of paint on the façade. The façade colour will be as you see it below (Astor White)
17/07/20 Cabinetry got delivered for kitchen, galley, laundry and bathrooms. As you can see the shells are pre-assembled. The tradie was telling me that they used to come fully assembled, i.e. with doors mounted, but they found that a certain % got damaged in delivery & installation, so they’re trialling delivering the doors separately to be installed on site (below right)
In the kitchen, apart from the wall oven tower, we have no overhead cupboards. This is because we have less wall space due to the big windows to let light in. Roughly 60% of the cupboard space will be drawers, particularly around the stove (for pots, pans & utensils), and the island (for crockery & cutlery). We upgraded all drawers to heavy duty Hettich drawers.
.18/07/20 to our surprise there was someone there on a Saturday, and started installing them
19/07/20 they had made good progress, and were hoping to add the handles before they finished for the day. If not, they would come back early in the week to do that.
As you can tell from the below shots of the powder room & main bathroom, we’ve gone with the same door profile (Colonial Square) throughout & colour (Ghostgum). Not sure if it was because we like the consistency, or whether we were so fried & over it during our multiple & looong ‘selection appointments’. Probably a bit of both The front door & garage door repeat the pattern, and hopefully ties to the weatherboard façade/look.
Below left the Laundry. The tall cupboard (middle) is the laundry chute return with the bottom part being a pull-out basket drawer. Below right is the chute cupboard in the upstairs Master Ensuite. The latter is just put in place, not fixed & will need to be pulled out to create the opening & chute through the floor. I’m still curious how they’re going to make that work because of the I-joists running right under it. Again, design vs build
20/07/20 the handles were added – again, same throughout.
21/07/20 skirting boards, architraves & doors delivered
They also did the top part of the downpipes
When I spoke to the supervisor over the phone, he mentioned the scaffolding was going to come down the next day. I innocently asked how they were going to paint the moulding around the façade/colonial windows once the scaffolding came down. Brief silence. Then some clicking & typing sounds, then a comment that nothing was in the Colour document. A quick question of which version he was looking at. A quick clarification. Then “Oh sh!t. I’ll get onto it now.” In fairness to him in his version it was called ‘trim’ which a builder understands as something different, but in fairness to me, I had clarified with the building coordinator in the office 2 months prior (thinking the same thing) & they fixed the wording which the builder had not seen. Lucky I swing past every day
22/07/20 True to his word, someone had come around early in the morning to paint the moulding before the scaffolding was due to come down later in the afternoon.
Just after lunch another 2 coats had gone on, tape gone & edges tied up. Really like the look. Build supervisor had come around to clean out the gutters. Because the scaffolding height could not accommodate the gutter guard installers, we have to do this after handover, and I didn’t want it clogging up between now & then (especially with our charged storm water system). Luckily the ‘money tree’ had shed all its leaves by now so it should be good til next Autumn.
Soon after a team arrived to take the scaffolding down – looking forward to seeing how the house will look from the outside.
23/07/20 next day the scaffolding had gone, and we got our first unimpeded look at what the house would look like from the outside. Our neighbour from across the road came by to say hello. They have a charming & homely weather board home, so they like our façade & double gable roof line as it as more fitting in character than a pure rendered block look. As mentioned in a previous blog post, we obviously have to be the ones happy with how it looks, but it’s nice to hear someone else with the same view – call it pride/vanity …. or … they were just being polite
Around the sides & back obviously it’s very ‘brick-blocky’ so will require plants/landscaping/structure to soften, and in the back in particular will require a pergola/vergola. With the scaffolding gone we have a better sense of the space, and can start thinking landscaping from back of the house to the pool and backyard
29/07/20 Happened to be there. Love this time of the day with the sun at this angle – the ‘Gold Afternoon Fix’. Whilst I was there the garage roof trusses arrived
30/07/20 Next day the trusses were installed. You may remember from a previous post that the orange lintel was just single (although hefty) beam, with its purpose to simply hold the steel frame in place during the construction of the house. This has now been replaced by 2 thicker beams as it will now support the roof.
03/08/20 The front door arrived, and no, it won’t be staying pastel green Quite a plain door compared to some of the fancy doors one sees on modern display homes. Per the previous comment, we tried to pick up the colonial pattern, and it will be painted white to match the window frame & garage door. We have a full height sidelight so hopefully that let’s enough light into the hallway.
The counter tops also went in today. And yes, again, same throughout The kitchen, galley & island tops have a thicker 40mm edge, but elsewhere (e.g. laundry & bathrooms) 20mm.
05/08/20 Material for the garage roof arrived (same colour as roof, i.e. Ironstone, but Klip Lok form). Scaffolding went also set up.
06/08/20 Next day it was installed. Didn’t think they would, but glad they sarked it (below left). Below right looking at the back of the garage northern end – interesting how they set up the gutter – vertically recessed. Not sure where the downpipe will go, or whether it will join the one at the side of the house.
View from Games room, overlooking garage roof towards the street. In hindsight I might have asked for more pitch but I’m glad that there is no wall (like at the front) to the right so the leaves & debris from tree has less chance to pile up. I’ll be putting gutter guard in there too. That way hopefully I can just hose the leaves off periodically.
This post has basically brought us back up to date, so I’ll stop it here. Catch you soon.