Farrow & Ball

Before and after – main bedroom

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Now that some parts of the house can be almost declared “done” I thought it might be fun to look back at how they have changed. First up is the master bedroom. Annoyingly I don’t have too many “before” images, but here are a few.

This was the simplest room to change. We just took up the carpet and painted the floor Farrow and Ball Strong White and chose Farrow and Ball Elephant’s Breath for the walls; a strangely named paint and quite a gentle but beautiful colour. Changed the light fitting and added some furniture.

After which it looked like this.

 

A complete kitchen

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Well nearly.

The kitchen in the flat is in and working.

The plan is to add some shelves above these units for storage. Then with this dresser, bought secondhand from the British Heart Foundation (Old Kent Road branch) some years ago now, gives the room a mix of fitted and free-standing.

The door into the lobby you can see here is Farrow and Ball Lulworth Blue which is actually left over from painting the garden shed. The door through to the bedroom area matches.

The rest of the room is starting to feel more complete, although far from finished.

The entrance to the flat has also improved greatly. For starters it’s no longer a death-trap as the roof area has been repaired.

The new front door has been installed. This had to be made for the space as the dimensions are slightly unusual.

Still need to pick a colour for it….

The idea is to paint the exterior well area white so it reflects the light back into the flat. The bars unfortunately will need to stay because it’s a slightly out of sight, plus we need to get a security light working.

The lobby area will be for storage (coats, boots etc). The wires will be boxed in and some kind of cupboard will probably go in front.

Some touch ups elsewhere too. The doors to the bathroom have had a coat of paint. Again using up colours from elsewhere. This is Farrow and Ball Setting Plaster which is the same colour as the sitting room. I think it works really well with the green of the bedroom.

In the pink

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Progress in the basement flat continues at pace as now it’s all about adding things that make it look better as opposed to stripping off plaster and generally wrecking the place as part of the “battle of the damp”.

Here’s a before shot.

And here’s the best of the interim ones.

The floor has been painted strong white like the rest of the house and the walls are setting plaster also from Farrow and Ball. I really like it, but it’s a slightly depressing colour to use when you pay someone to plaster the walls, then carefully prime them only to paint them basically the same colour as they were before. Again the ceiling is also the same colour and the skirting will be too.

And one of the many deliveries that helped get us there.

The boiler will be boxed in as part of a cupboard.

From this angle you can see the unpainted end of the room which will be a kitchen area. The lighting is already in for that work area.

They are from B&Q.

Still some work to be done on the door and obviously the stairs beyond but you can see the flagstones are back down and looking good.

The view into the bedroom.

And here’s the fireplace with the beautiful tiles that were uncovered when the heater was removed. Unfortunately there’s some pretty extensive damage, although ultimately the plan is for a wood burning stove in here so that might cover the gap and work. We shall see.

Here’s a close up of the lights which are from John Lewis (like the ones in the bedroom). The plan is that a sofa will sit under these.

Off the entrance to the flat is a kind of cellar which sits under the front steps. It was a horrible hole full of coal dust and a bit scary. It’s now had a new floor put in and is ready to act as some handy storage.

The plan is to put another toilet in the space under the hall stairs and because of that some serious digging has been required to put new plumbing in. Which also means going out the back door and particularly using the outside tap is a bit tricky.

And lastly, also outside some of the holes in the patio filled from our large supply of random bricks.

An update in three parts

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In recent weeks we have made a bit of progress.

First up is the plaster in the hall and on the first landing. It’s been done and dried, so we can now decide on colours.

This part was a particularly bad spot and we’ve had it simply redone for now. But I’d still like to replace some corbels at some point soon.

And now we need to finish stripping all the paper from this tricky section on the top floor. I’m a bit afraid of this bit as we’ll need to use ladders on the stairs. Not keen.

Then next is the basement. We’re due to start work down here shortly as at present it’s still totally untouched. We have a totally unusable bathroom down there which we will reinstate. And so in readiness it has been cleared of all the junk it has accumulated in the (what must be) decades since it was last functioning.

As you can see it’s in a sorry state.

And from one bathroom to another.

The one upstairs one is almost done.

We were going to do the floor in black and white tiles, but we decided that tiles were too cold and lino too horrible and we couldn’t find anything affordable in-between. So instead we painted the boards the same colour as the floors in the bedrooms. And actually I now think we should use this colour more elsewhere and have greater consistency in the flooring. I used to think it was a bit unimaginative to paint everything white (or in this case Farrow and Ball Strong White) but now I wonder if it isn’t a good idea and allows you to be more daring with wall colours and still feel like all the rooms and house are connected. Anyway one to think over as going with white floors in the front hall and kitchen might be a bit much – not sure.

This piece of furniture next to the sink is a new addition. We picked it up for next to nothing in a dodgy looking local shop.

The clothes airer is still going strong and proving to be really useful.

I am not certain about the colours of the walls. At the moment they are just white and I quite like it. But I did have my heart set on using some wallpaper and colour in this room. Ideally this paper from Timorous Beasties.

But the one thing we have decided not to touch is the paint on the door. I like it just the way it is.

This room was actually subdivided into two rooms when we moved in, a thin kitchen and a thin bathroom. We took out the partition wall and made it one room again.

The pictures from that stage are here.