You know a house is going to be the bidnez when colour expert, Rachel from Hello Colour gives you a heads up that she’s involved in a major renovation project and it’s going to blow my socks off. I quickly obtained those contact details and waited patiently for the final project to be ready (refreshing my inbox every so often in case I’d missed an update!)
Turns out, while I didn’t think she would have had me awaiting an underwhelming home, Rach has under-promised and over-delivered on this real reno. When you take a look at the pics you’ll see what I’m on about.
So who were these mysterious renovators, Rach was raving about?! Well fair to say they were a bit of a #renopowercouple. Parents of two little girls, Abbey (an interior stylist) and Marcus (a builder) had one mission in mind when they set out to renovate…. in Abbey’s words, they were looking for “a crazy ass challenge!” They had a vision to create a gorgeous high-end home for a family to cherish.
“We also wanted to create an inner-city sanctuary filled with oodles of natural light and oooooh so many pretty things. Our belief is you don’t need to compromise good design and aesthetics for functionality – you can have both!”
True that, Abbey! This Newport home is INSANELY gorgeous and to be completely honest puts a fair majority of The Block rooms to shame.
I’m pumped to share this real renovation story with you, so please – read on… Abbey dishes it up for us in the realest of ways (and with a touch of my writing style BTW which I’m thinking I should potentially copywrite 😉 haha).
What was the scale of your renovation?
Being self-confessed perfectionists we always knew our plans to renovate were more focused on creating an amazing house than touching a few bits and pieces. However what we didn’t anticipate, was that meant touching everything in the house! From the new roof, to replacing every window and weatherboard, almost everything in this house is brand new. To that point, we never wanted our place to look like a new build, it was integral to ensure the new façade suited the existing streetscape and maintained character and charm, just a modern adaptation of a period home.
Facade before
Facade after
Did you use an architect, draftsperson or interior designer and how did you decide which to go with?
We designed the house ourselves with a little help of a draftsperson. As my husband is a builder and I was studying interior styling we had a good idea of what we wanted to create!
Bedroom before
Bedroom after
How long did the reno take from first plans until moving back in?
We first broke soil just over 9 months ago and worked relentlessly ever since. Our gorgeous neighbours let us stay in their place over the Christmas period whilst they were on holidays for 6 weeks which minimised the disruption.
The remainder of the 3 ½ months we were out of the house, we were staying with family in the eastern suburbs spending anywhere between 4-5 hours commuting every day between the east and Newport dropping kids to childcare and then returning to the city for work. It was a damn nightmare and almost broke us as Marcus was running his construction company and I was working my day job in the city – I am exhausted reliving the experience to be honest… ha!
Backyard before
Backyard after
What did you find most challenging during the renovation process?
Wearing soooo many hats – from mum/dad hat to employee/business owner to husband/wife hat. There was a point where we had to acknowledge we had a lot on our plate. I had to come to terms with the fact I couldn’t do everything well all the time – and sometimes good enough was ok!
Did you stick to budget?
It’s a grey area but can comfortably say we were close to budget!!! Budget smudget!
Bathroom before
Bathroom after
What was your biggest investment?
The biggest investment was the Elba marble kitchen and kick ass $15,000 three metre high aluminium sliding doors to the living/kitchen area.
What is your fave feature of your new home?
The kitchen/living/dining area. Oh, and the bathrooms – the natural light is divine!
Living area before
Living area after
What do you love the most that you spent the least amount of money on?
Too hard to pick one!!
Master bedroom
What compromises did you make along the way?
By far the biggest one was the kids, I haven’t been as present which is something that I feel a little sad about. Oh, and I’d say that our social life definitely hasn’t been as “active” since embarking on such an ambitious project.
Bathroom before
Bathroom after
Did you access any training or resources to help you in your reno that you would recommend?
Marry a builder! Jokes! My love of interiors saw me study interior styling but that isn’t something available to everyone. For me, the most powerful element that is often overlooked is to give thought on how you want to feel in your home or the space. This “feel” is the anchor that will help guide your decisions around fixtures, fittings, colour palette, textures and be that reference point to keep coming back to.
Another point to raise is try to have a clear vision of what you like and if that isn’t achievable what you don’t like. Also, if you’re not fluent in the building language, use imagery and acquaint yourself with visual aids like Instagram and Pinterest. This will make sourcing a lot easier and save you oodles of time. You will thank me once your reno has been going for a while and the overwhelm hits!
Dining before
Dining after
What could have not lived without through your renovation?
Rach Rimmer from Hello Colour – we spent countless hours in quest of finding the right grey for our cabinetry. It would seem there are far more than 50 shades of grey! And ps. the colour we choose for the kitchen was 2pac low sheen Dulux Dieskau.
Kitchen before
Kitchen after
What are some of the social media sites and accounts that have inspired you through your renovation?
Buildher Collective, Tecture, Dot and Pop and Australian Architecture
If you renovated again, what would you do differently?
Not live in an active building site!!
What’s one thing you’d tell a friend doing a reno?
Engage your core, prepare yourself for the emotional exhaustion and enjoy the ride!
Open plan living
Separate living space
And just a few quick fire questions…
Period or modern?
Fusion of both???? Ha!
White or colour?
White – every day of the week!
Brick or weatherboard?
Weatherboard
Open plan or separate living?
Open
And finally… How would you describe your reno in one word?
Hard to do when you can see how much I waffle on, we are beyond proud of what we have created – a beautiful suburban house for a loving family to enjoy!
