Plasterboarding & Gas Works

We have finalised our choice of floors and received the quotaion. We have also confirmed the doors and their openings, including the mid-stairs and under-stairs cupboards and we've chosen the handles and locks. The stairs will be delivered 'unfinished' to be stained and lacquered when in place. 

Internally, the ceilings and walls are now fully covered with appropriate plasterboard.

Much of the work now has to be put on hold for a couple of weeks while the Gas supply is brought from the mains to the property. 

On the one hand, this is annoying because it will delay us moving in but, on the other hand, we'll have more time to choose units for the kitchen and bathrooms. We are having trouble buying off-the-shelf units for the small en-suite and are considering some bespoke work. However, we've spent more than we anticipated on a few things so we need to budget carefully. We knew this would happen, of course, we've been there before - twice.

We usually justify the overspend in our minds by relating the additional cost over the next ten years to the enjoyment of living with the results! If you love where you live, going away for holidays is not quite so important, so that cost can be off-set, too.

I don't suppose there will be much progress to report over the next couple of weeks so look out for the next update around the middle of August.

Floors and Doors

The ground floor has now been beautifully screeded over the underfloor heating pipes and we've received samples of flooring and door finishes and chosen the ones we'd like. Because of 'new build' rules, every home must include a downstairs w.c. that is easily accessible by people with walking difficulties, including wheelchair users. This access rule also applies to the front door. It means minimum widths and flat floor access. We also noticed that, on the plans, the ground floor doors are wider than the doors upstairs. Apparently, approximately 2% of people in Britain are wheelchair users. 

Originally, we were looking to use engineered hardwood throughout the ground floor, which is around 100 square metres. Having looked at prices and compared them with good quality laminate (shown above), we decided to save several hundreds of £££s. Without fitting costs, underlay, etc., the price of hardwood averaged about 4x the price of laminate.

The small sample in the image is the door colour, the dark grey-ish oak will be used throughout the ground floor and we chose a lighter finish for upstairs floors. These are all suitable for bathrooms and kitchens.

The stairs we've ordered are wooden and will be stained to our colour choice. At this moment, what colour this will be is a mystery!

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Other work that has been going on in the house includes: loft insulation, more plumbing and some carpentry. With the plumbing and electrics in place, the plasterboard will be going up and we'll get a real feel for the inside of our future home. The carpenters will be building the framework for built-in wardrobes and cupboards. 

We have only been visiting the site at weekends when there are no work teams there. All instructions we need to give them have been by email. Interesting times... :) 

Link to next instalment...