The Hallway - The Final Reveal

The day has finally come!  The reveal of the hallway.  It's only been over a year since we started working on it, but good things come to those that wait!

Telephone table from Indigo Furniture. I actually won this in a competition a few years ago, which is  the best (and probably only) competition I've won.  I LOVE it.  

The hanging decorations were gifts on our wedding day, as was the photo frame.  The orchid was a present from the hubby a few years ago which I have managed to keep alive!

The sanded and stained floor and the plush new grey carpet runner.

My lovely bunny prints from HAM, which were gifts from my parents for my last birthday and Christmas.  Black frames, RIBBA from Ikea.

New radiator installed.

New turtle mat to catch dirt on shoes - Christmas gift from my parents. Exciting times when you ask for a doormat for Christmas!

The blind was handmade by me :) 

The light fitting is a HEKTOR from Ikea (was a bit fiddly to fit!)

Yummy floor!

Again, black frames, RIBBA from Ikea (£4 each).  Funny childhood photos, priceless.

New white painted door frames and staircase

The new loft hatch - so smooth!  No more artex!

RIBBA Frame, £7 from Ikea.  Print in frame, printed for free.

Just in case whether you were in any doubt about whether it's an improvement over what we had before!  Here it is in all it's ghastly horror.  Most of these are from moving in day so include the old bathroom too!

I'm so so pleased with how it's turned out

Costs

In terms of costs, I haven't added up every penny, but here are some ball park figures:

Plastering: £780
Paint: £150
Carpet: £90 plus £50 fitting
Blind: £35
Flooring (sanding): £100
Flooring (stain and varnish): £55
New radiator: £90
Under stairs storage: £100
Lighting: £36

Total: ~£1500

Eek! That's a lot of money!  I don't know if we have necessarily added £1500 to the value of the house, but my gosh does it look a heck of a lot better. A lot less unwanted texture!  Apart from the plastering which was a HUGE part of the budget, I really don't think we couldn't have done it any cheaper - we did all the plumbing, sanding, painting, decorating and sewing ourselves!

Which makes it a great time to start a plastering course this weekend - yay!   What have you got planned for the weekend?

The stair carpet is finished!

We finally have stair carpet!  Yay!  It's like walking on a cloud :-D

Let me tell you the story....

Sometime back in November time, we were in a retail park and stumbled into one of the big furniture shops that sells everything from dining tables to carpet.  We had a good stroke of all the carpets (sounds creepy but a bit of a must!), and the hubby picked the one he liked.  It got the thumbs up.  I wasn;t sure of the colour to start with but it grew on me the more I thought about it.

But at £26.99 per metre squared, I was left reeling at the price!  We didn't need much to make a runner, but because of the roll widths of the carpet, we would be looking at £200+.  Eek!

I took the name and the colour of the carpet though, and did some googling on the way home.  I found out some online stores that give the same carpet a slightly different name at a much reduced price. Around £14 per metre squared - much more tolerable.

I went into a local carpet shop to enquire about getting the edges whipped and getting it fitted.  The guy in the shop then went on to tell me all the pro's and cons' of getting the carpet whipped vs. folding the edges under.  What I though was going to be a straightforward conversation then left me spiraling with more decisions!  The main con which he kept emphasising was how easily the edge of the whipping can start ravelling if you catch it with the hoover or something.

I went away and ummed and ahhed and decided to go for the folded option.  But then we struggled to find a fitter!  At last yesterday we had someone round to fit the carpet.

Let's just remember what it looked like before:

And now!  The pile is quite deep which gives it a bit of colour variation as some parts are flattened and others aren't.  I don't think I mind that, but it was a slight concern when we bought it as I wonder how it will look with time. I guess only time will tell!

I must admit, the first thing I saw when I walked in was the bottom step:

Where it has been nailed at the bottom, it doesn't look quite right, almost like it has been pulled in slightly the wrong direction.

Apart from that, I'm really pleased with it, and it's a great way to start progress on the house in 2016!

Total Costs

Carpet - £89 incl. delivery

Underlay - Free, left over from our bedroom carpet

Carpet grippers - Free, left over from previous project, and we retained the ones we took off the stairs for re-use.

Fitting - £50

TOTAL = £139

How are your projects coming along?