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Sunday 26 January 2014

Our Main Bedroom DIY attempt



When we moved in back in October, the first thing I wanted to change was the colour of the walls in the main bedroom.

Although it looks great in the photo, the burgundy walls were just too dark.

We began our first attempt at DIY and bought the paint, new rollers, prepared the walls washing them down with sugar soap and covered the flooring.

Excited to transform this room we began painting, it soon became apparent that this could possibly take us forever.

No matter how many coats of paint we applied, the dark burgundy was still showing through!!

After 3 long days of struggling to achieve a decent finish, we accepted we needed a professional to give the finishing coat.

I reluctantly called our builder to arrange for someone to come and finish the room.

They did a great job and it was finished in a day.

We chose Dulux 'White mist', this is my go to colour, it's not a stark optical white, it has a slight grey tinge to it and we have painted many rooms in a previous property this colour & it has always worked.

During the painting our builders did find a damp issue underneath the bay window, one of the wooden sashes is rotten and we'll need to have it replaced (something we are still yet to address).

Here's the transformation...

BEFORE




DURING






AFTER












There's still a few things to finish off eg: paint the bedside tables & add some more artwork to our walls to inject some colour.

Get the look:

Duvet: The White Company 
http://www.thewhitecompany.com/sale/bed-linen/genoa-bed-linen-collection--eucalyptus/

Bed: John Lewis
http://www.johnlewis.com/house-by-john-lewis-maine-bedstead-kingsize/p368344?colour=White

Wardrobe: Furniture Village -http://www.furniturevillage.co.uk/Inventory/Bedroom/Welle-System-300/4-door-wardrobe-with-polished-doors-8386.aspx

Mirror: Homesense
http://www.homesense.com/page/department_finishing_touches

Touch Lamps: Homebase
http://www.homebase.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?langId=110&storeId=10151&partNumber=074825

Chest of Drawers: 2nd hand - Try searching ebay or the gumtree for similar

Dresser: 2nd hand Try searching ebay or the gumtree for similar

Chair: upcycled, an old chair I painted & reupholstered Try searching ebay or the gumtree for similar 




Sunday 12 January 2014

Welcome...

Hi, my name is Ralph and together with my wife Susan, we have recently bought a beautiful Victorian terrace in North London. 

Getting to this point was hard enough in a competitive London property market but now the hard work really begins to renovate this property which has been rented out and thus not been decorated for years into our dream home.

Let's start at the beginning and show you around.


Firstly, the front of the house. 

The house is a three-bedroom end of terrace with a red door & decorative stained glass, period sash windows and the prerequisite turret which my wife demanded. Although we don't anticipate any major changes to the front of the property, as it was essentially what we fell in love with, repairs will be required to some of the pointing and most of the white paintwork needs refreshing.

The front room is large with high ceilings and numerous period features such as wooden shutters for the windows, 7-arm chandelier with ceiling rose, cast iron radiators and a stunning marble fireplace.


Living Room 

Open plan Living / Dining Room

The living room leads onto the dining room in an open-plan arrangement which creates a light and airy living space. 
The dining room has the same period features as the living room.
Identical 7-arm chandelier, a 2nd marble fireplace, polished floorboards, cast iron radiators and French doors leading out to the garden.


Dining Room with double doors leading to the garden

Through the hallway to the back of the house is a separate WC and then onto the kitchen.
The kitchen is a great size 5m x 3.3m but is looking a little tired and has limited storage so this is the first room that we will renovate.


Kitchen

At the back of the kitchen is a bay window that looks out over the garden.
The garden (or should I say courtyard) is small, we had to compromise somewhere and this was it, great size house but small garden.
Although with some TLC I'm sure we'll have this garden looking inviting in no time.

Garden

So now lets head upstairs to rest of the house...

At the top of the stairs, directly in front of you is the 2nd bedroom, it's a great size room and fits a king size bed very comfortably.
This room only needs some decorating & to remove a noisy boiler and relocate this to the kitchen which is directly underneath.
This room overlooks the garden but unfortunately the house backing directly onto ours can see straight into this room so we'll have to come up with some clever tall tree planting in the garden for privacy!!

Second bedroom

Next to this bedroom is our bathroom, this is on the small side 1.8m x 2m so only enough room for toilet, basin & shower / bath.
It's in keeping with the period styling of our property navy tiling, burgundy wallpaper and bronzed mirror panels so it is quite dark, we will be modernizing as soon as possible.
The shower pressure is terrible and some plumbing work will need to be carried out.

Bathroom

Along the hallway on the other side of the bathroom is the 3rd bedroom.
This is the smallest out of the three bedrooms but still a good size approx. 3m x 3m.
It's a lovely light filled room with a large sash window that looks over the side of our back garden.
Nothing much to do in here except some painting & decorating.

Third bedroom

The last room in the house to show you is the main bedroom, situated next to the 3rd bedroom at the front of the house.
It's huge, the most spacious room in the house.
Filled with period features, large bay sash window with wooden shutters, cast iron radiators, ceiling rose and its own original Victorian cast iron fireplace with gorgeous floral tiling surround.

Main bedroom

As lovely as the burgundy walls are they just have to go, it's the first bit of DIY we will do, they're just too dark and make the room feel much smaller than what it is. We'll be painting the room white.

So we hope you enjoy our Victorian Terrace Transformation, I'm off to buy some paint!!