Contractor Confessions

After waiting for CNY to be over, we finally met the 2 contractors whom friends and family have recommended for the quotations. I was a bit worried that they won't meet our budget of $50k (and this is only for wet works). Fortunately my sister's contractor Patrick came close to $50k while the other quote was $70k. Hoorrray! Still, we have to budget another $10k to 20k for the fittings, furnishings and furniture.


Hand painted Viet cement tiles at An Huat, Zion Road 

Every day I'm learning a lot about renovation - what the whole progress entails, what should come first, what's the best way to work out the layout in terms of practicality and design - and terms like wet works, screed, varnishing wood, tempered glass, PVC pipes, pot belly grills, aluminum powered coated grills haha. Ultimately I think it's important to be a snappy decision maker and be able to communicate your ideas to the contractor in English, Mandarin or Hokkien, especially in my case without an ID.

 

Love these gorgeous tiles at $4/pc

The quote doesn't include tiles, sinks, toilet bowls, etc - fittings that we have to buy ourselves because we want to be able to pick what we want. And for starters, I'm really obsessed with the TILES - which is the no.1 thing I have always wished for in my dream home. An ID friend had showed me a picture of ornate cement vietnamese tiles that she found in Spore and eversince I hadn't forgotten them.

And by chance, I passed by this old-school tiles shop, An Huat at Zion Road and there they are again - my dream tiles in all colours and designs. I made a mental note to return and spoke to SS, the young and unassuming marketing director (who happened to be helping in the family biz). My mind was racing as I stared at the wall of tiles - cubanism, peranakan, moroccan, granada, mediterrean. They could work in different styles of decor. L liked them too but wanted to compare prices with another place that his contractor recommended - Sin Lek Building at Eunos - which has quite a large array of commercial tiles (I don't fancy any) but they do have some nice tiles that look like timber. 

Sin Lek Building at Eunos

So we went back to An Huat and happily agreed on the 3 viet tile designs for the kitchen, balcony, staircase landing upstairs and also these cute retro-looking honeycomb tiles ($5/pc) for the 3 toilet floors. A tip: the best way to avoid a conflict between you and your spouse is to let the taste-maker (aka me ;) shortlist the choices and then consult the better half on selecting the final ones. This way, both parties are happy! Anyway we ended up spending $4k on the tiles (exceeded budget of $3k) but it'd be our main design feature so it'd be worth the splurge.

I picked these lovely retro honeycomb 'Hexa' black/white tiles for our toilet floors

So for our floor and wall finishes, we are hacking all the old tiles and laying cement screed for most parts of the flooring, except the kitchen which will be fully tiled with these gorgeous blue-white-grey tiles at $4/ pc. As L and I love cooking, la cucina will be our playground. To balance the ornate tiles, we are keeping the rest of the kitchen minimally white but playing with lots of texture from the white glossy 3D subway tiles (70cents/pc) for the walls and choosing white distressed wood laminate finish for the cabinets. We are also hacking the walls so it's a semi-open kitchen where we can interact with our guests in the dining /living room.

Here are some ispirazioni per la cucina - don't you just love tiles!




Idea for our fully tiled kitchen floor - along with white cabinets and walls

Idea for white glossy subway or metro brick tiles in the kitchen

Subway tiles are so gorgeous in a modern kitchen! 

See the idea for the black and white floor tiles against the white subway wall tiles

Also found this in a local interior magazine and will replicate the idea of sewing mahcine and basin! 

Love love these geometric tiles which I chose in blue, grey and white for the staircase landing!

Tiles are great to dress up the hall or corridor

Modern tiles can be used to jazz up a contemporary home especially if you like old and new together.

Do you know your tiles by their names? We need and love the modern roman holiday! :) 

 

Tiles play such an important design role in ancient civilisations and cultures from Cuban Art Deco apartments to Moroccan harlems and Peranakan mansions.  

You can find tiles in countries around the world like China, Italy, Morocco, India, Cuba etc