Thursday 19 December 2013

Bedroom Complete

The first room has been completed at long last. :) Carpet went into the master bedroom today, it looks great and I'm delighted with it. I went with a thicker 11mm underlay and it feels soft and luxurious.

Pictures below, with flash and without. The carpet is an almost silvery-white, or an extremely light grey.









The bathroom is 95% complete also, pictures very soon!




Friday 29 November 2013

Full Electrical Replacement

Work started about two weeks ago on the next stage of the job, re-wiring the entire house for both electrical and CAT 6a. The previous wiring in the house was confined to a light switch and centre light in each room only. The ground floor had surface mounted electrical outlets; no other sockets existed throughout the house. Wiring was typical 1940-1960s, with black rubberised cabling, round pin sockets and braided flex hanging for ceiling lights. This all needed to go.

The fuse box is located in the hall; as such this is the location of the biggest mess of cables. An attempt was made to get the cabling behind the ceiling architrave, but the wall plaster had binded to it and it crumbled once a hole in the wall plaster was made. Several repairs were required in this area anyhow:



Ground floor front room:



Hallway:


A new hallway light and ceiling rose will be created here, along with a stairs wall light:



Ground floor return:


First floor landing:


First floor front room. Wiring for wall lights and various sockets and lamp sockets:










First floor rear room:




And a teaser of how the top floor rooms are panning out. Hours, upon hours, upon HOURS of filling, sanding, priming, sanding, painting, sanding, painting... etc. Colours are by Farrow and Ball and include Stiffkey Blue, Clunch and French Grey. Windows are still not finished as of yet:









Thursday 7 November 2013

External Soil Pipe & Underground Sewage

So a new sewer pipe was installed last week, replacing the old line which sat below the outside sink. Here was the old iron pipe:


The new pipe with AJ, apologies for the quality:




Entering the new period soil pipe assembly:


The elbow is now straighter than shown and installed flush in the render, more pics soon:


And just some quick pictures of the original gas lighting pipes. These were located in the ground floor rear room ceiling:



Wednesday 23 October 2013

Stairs Ceiling

The very top floor stair ceiling was finished yesterday evening, along with the installation of an attic stairs. The original ceiling was lost many years ago and had been replaced with modern plasterboard. As outlined previously, this was removed recently and has been replaced with the new 50mm insulated board. As unauthentic as this modern ceiling is, it makes no sense to replace it with latte and lime plaster, due to cost, heat loss, finish and the potential of a fire hazard:




The ladder attached to the door allows easy access to the attic and folds away neatly:




Friday 18 October 2013

Stairs Plaster Complete

The skim coat was applied to the stairs walls last week, completing the job. Despite being a lime plaster, it has the exact same finish as modern plaster, possibly smoother.




I also removed the ceiling in its entirety, so it can be redone early next week:



The plaster on the left is blended smoothly into the original plaster, despite its nasty appearance:






A few other spots were done on the first floor, building out from the brick: