Getting creative with paints and pipes

The last blog post was a bit of a digression into the wonderful world of flatpack furniture. In this post we return to the wonderful world of our ground floor apartment. Before we check out how the interior is going, a quick look at the exterior

As you know, council regulations stipulate specially-lined awnings over the windows to protect the upstairs from any fire that breaks out downstairs. This had to include an awning over the front door. After a bit of a discussion with the builders and architect, we all agreed that we could tweak the awning over the door to make it more 'porch' style. It does the fire awning job and helps to frame up the nice panelled door.

So to the inside. We had got to the stage where things had been plastered, so it was time to paint! We have some lovely friends who came over to help us - thanks Aideen, Gary, Rob and Roger.

Gary and Aideen capture the true spirit of painting. 

Steve and Rob working hard

Jo the only person to be photographed actually painting

In the living area:

The kitchen tiled and painted...

...then with the celebrated furniture from the previous post in position. It looks kind of pink in this photo, but it isn't.

The brick chimney feature looking resplendent in Summer Horizon blue.

The TV nook is still the builders' shelf, but a painted builders' shelf at least. The heatpump was supposed to be mounted on the wall next to the front door with the external unit sitting on the ground at the back of the house. But the pipe to the outside unit would have meant a large hole in the external frame of a nice window. So Don and Jez from Arctic Spark, the heatpump installers, installed the heatpump on the back wall, took the pipe out the back of the apartment, routed it up and along to the external unit now sitting down the right hand alley of the house. To get the fall they needed for the moisture created by the heatpump, they took a pipe down to the floor drain at the bottom left hand corner of the back of the house. It took a bit of thinking to get there and it was quite lucky this was a Saturday so we were there to tell them what we did and didn't like. The actual result was much preferred to our original plan. 

The heatpump installers ran the pipe to the external unit along the back of the apartment and out to the outside wall of the house. Right hand wall in this photo is the outside of the left hand wall in the apartment. Notice the pipe for draining the moisture on the left hand wall here running down to the drain in the left hand corner of the back of the house. There was a flight of stairs in the basement which in times gone by was connected to the upstairs by a big hole in the floor - this hole had been boarded up when we bought the house. The builders shifted the stairs so we can we can still get up on to the rock and the underside of the house.

Tiled entrance for those wet shoes and brollies

In the bedroom:

Bedroom wall, where the head of the bed will go, now painted and rocking light and power

In the bathroom:

Jo laid out the wire for the underfloor heating in the bathroom

Bathroom painted, tiled and now the frosted glass is in!

Light and power:

You will have noticed the lights and plug sockets in the photos above, and the electrician has been hard at work wiring everything up to a new power board located on the right hand side of the house. It has two electrical meters, one for the house and one for the apartment. We have to make a special mention to Tony the electrician here. As you will have read above, we had to relocate the heatpump and that meant it wasn't going to be where Tony had planned a power connection for it. However, the way Tony had wired it meant that there was a complete circuit for it in it's new location, rather than having to add it to, and maxing out, an existing circuit. Don the heatpump installer was very impressed by what Tony had done - and it is not often that tradies complement other tradies' work, so when they do you know it's good!