Phase 1 After Photos

As I said in the previous post, we began talking with a contractor last Fall.  We met with him a few times, trying to decide the scope of this first phase.  He mentioned we might want to get an interior designer involved to help us make some decisions.  This was a great move for us!  It did slow the process a bit, but I do not regret it at all.

So this remodeling started the middle of May and ended the end of June.  How wonderful it was to see the progress each and every day!  

Here are some photos of the entryway.  (You may click on any of these photos on the blog to see the photo larger.)  The stair railing was completely redone.  (See photos in earlier post for before pictures)  We chose square spindles with square newel posts - having those painted white and then the hand rail and nosing (bottom piece) both stained to match the flooring.  We really like the Arts & Craft style homes and think the new stair way adds a little of that to our home.  (The closet doors in the picture on the right will also be painted white in August)

 Bottom of stairway, inside entrance                                                Top of stairway,
                                                                                              carpet is tan not mauve

Here is another angle.  The front door currently is the original.  We haven't decided for sure if we should just paint it white or replace it with a new door.  It would be nice to have a door with a window to let some light into the entryway.

We had hardwood floors installed in the entryway, bathroom, living room and dining room.  It is a varying width hand-scraped hardwood floor. Love the way it turned out!! (nice pedicure! It's only 4 weeks old. Didn't intend to have my foot in the photo, oh well.)

 Here is the new half bath off the entryway.  This is where our interior designer helped a lot!  We had chosen a light, which had 3 lights in it that would hang centered over a mirror.  Her comment to that was, "it is kind of ordinary, I think we can do better than that....how about two sconces, one on each side of a mirror."  She gave us great direction.  We chose the granite counter top first, from the "bone yard".  It is a granite remnant that was outside behind the showroom building.  If we do this again, going to the "bone yard", we will do it in Spring or Summer or Fall... not when there is a fresh snow, it is freezing, and all the remnants have to be brushed off by hand so you can actually see what they look like!  We then took a hunk of that granite to pick out the vanity cabinet color.

 Really happy with the way this bathroom turned out!  It is really pretty, wish it was our master bath!!! 

(It is really hard to take pictures of bathrooms!)

Here is the living room.  One thing that slowed the project down a bit were these doors.  When Chad was painting the woodwork, he pulled back the old carpet and discovered that the subfloor had been wet, rotting in some areas.  In order to repair the subfloor, the sliding door would need to be removed.  We weren't planning on replacing the sliding door during this phase but decided to go ahead with that since they had to remove it.  The old sliding doors were really inefficient and not the most attractive either.  (This door will be painted white in August.) 

 Chad did a lot of painting in this project, woodwork and walls.  The contractor's painters did paint the bathroom and entryway wall that extend to second level.


 Here is the wall in living room with the bookcases and fireplace.  We still need to get the shelves back in, decide what to put on them (not as many shelves, no glass doors and not as many nick-knacks!) and decide what to do with the fireplace.  Our interior designer suggested painting the stone fireplace white as well.  We don't mind the stone the way it is, but painting it white would probably look nice too.  We do not like the brass fireplace doors.  Not sure what we will do about those.  Our interior designer helped chose paint colors too.  We wanted a light grey but the samples we had chosen just weren't looking quite right.  We do love this grey!

The opening to the right in this picture is where the wall to wall, floor to ceiling mirror used to be, yuck!  Not anymore.  It is now a framed archway, open to the dining room.

Here is a view into the dining room from the living room.

And a view from the dining room into the living room.  We might be using the dining room as a play area for now.  I would like to get something to store toys in so it looks presentable.

Here are some photos from the upstairs loft area.  Chad painted the walls and woodwork up here too.  We had new carpet installed.  Our interior designer advised using the same carpet we had put in the two bedrooms upstairs.  That way the space would have a more consistent, cohesive look.  We would have liked to do something different, perhaps something a little more exciting but in the end agreed that it would look more consistent and less choppy.

This is the light in the entryway that also provides light upstairs in the loft area.  Sorry about the blurry picture, I tried multiple times to get a clear picture but they all turned out fuzzy.  This probably is not a light we would have picked out on our own.  It was one of the lights the interior designer suggested.  I do really like it though.

After the doors in this space are painted, we need to decide what furniture to have in the rooms.  Now these areas feel more like our style of home.  Can't wait for the next project!! ;)  Will it be the kitchen or our master bedroom and bath????