Wow, has it been a journey! Where do I even start?!
Over the last three months, so much has happened. I know I have said this in all my previous blog posts, but you won’t believe where we are now!
Firstly, and most importantly, I gave birth to my beautiful daughter, Halle Amirah Morris, on the 21st of February. It has been an adjustment we’re still getting used to, and challenging at times, juggling a newborn and a 2.5 year old Jesse, while living a nomadic lifestyle, moving between rentals and my in-laws’ house, all while the renovations have been taking place. It is in the midst of these challenges that remind both Richie and myself why we do it all, and we know that everything will be worth it in the end… speaking of that, we are literally just weeks away from moving into our new dream home!
Baby aside, here are our other highlights over the last three months…
We’ve finished designing window frames for our back door, and they have arrived and been installed. The reason we are so excited about this is because they let a lot of light into our back living room, and anyone who knows me or follows my interior design work knows I love natural lighting.
Our tiles have been installed, and the floor is completely done! There is still a bit more tiling work to be done, but floor wise, we are onto the sealing stage, and are ready for the final layer of grout. Throughout this process, I’ve both learned and appreciated how important it is to have a great relationship with tilers, and all the others involved in every aspect of the renovation.
Tiling in action
My personal brand and aesthetic as you all know, is based around the rustic, bohemian, natural look. I’m innately and deeply inspired by Morocco and Spain for not only their aesthetics but cultures too, and a big (but good) challenge with our current renovation is the unique look we are trying to achieve. Most tradesmen in Australia are drawn to the ‘perfect’ finished look, polished and modern. It is in my personality to strive to achieve things out of the ordinary, and thus, I have presented my tradesmen the task of creating a rustic, ‘lived in’ look for our new home.
The joinery has been made and installed and we are in love with our New Age Veneers Panels. Touching back on the rustic look I am going for, Richie and I went to a recycled timber yard to choose joinery panels for other areas, so it had an aged timber look!
Marius Aurenti did our cement render. Both bathroom floors, including showers have now been completed. The product is a 3mm thick cement render which can be used in wet areas, basins and sinks. What we did, was form the basins and create the substrates of which the cement render is applied to. This is a really unique and hands on process. Typically, one would put a bench top in, and the basin will sit on top of it. For our tradesmen and carpenters, they had to learn what to do so that this product could be applied on top of it! We truly hope they have enjoyed the experience learning as much as we have.
We’ve chosen all the hardware for our house from Bankston Architectural, which I talk about more here. I have a whole section dedicated to each brand we have chosen to work with where I explain not only why we chose to use them, but share my favourite products too! I will be sending out regular newsletters with these… so keep an eye out!
Some of Bankston Architectural’s amazing hardware.
Finally, we have worked very hard to decide on the right colour and tone of paint. Working with Bauwerk Colour, a company that sells natural paint, we put a lot of thought and passion into finally deciding on the Limewash paint. Being a natural product, the paint’s colour is very much affected by natural light, the room it sits within, the colour of the floor, the tones of the decor and everything around it. This means that although the same paint is used throughout different areas of our house, each room will achieve a look and feel unique to its own! We are so excited that we’ve decided on this amazing, versatile colour.
Watch my video on our paint-choosing journey here.
Playing with paint!
Renovating, owning (multiple) businesses and running a household with a newborn and toddler poses many challenges, but I love what I do, and I love my family. Juggling everything is definitely not for the faint hearted, but as I said… in a few weeks, it’ll all have been worth it and we can’t wait to show you our new home.
Here are just some images of where we are at now!
