It had been nearly 4 months in our house and 2 months since I last posted anything! Time for decision review session 2!
I am gonna talk about Living areas this time.
Ceiling Height: We opted for 2550 cm ceilings upgrade. Though unplanned, this ceiling height somehow had given an uniformed look with the window height, recess height and the door heights. I like this height similarity, thank God we didn't go for any higher ceilings, otherwise we wouldn't have known that we needed to increase the heights of windows and doors also to match with 2700 cm ceiling.
Air con: We didn't upgrade the aircon that was included in the package with standard two-zone system. So far it had passed the test for both Heating and Cooling mode over the last months! And even though we used it a lot, the electricity bill is NOT crazy as we expected!
Shelving: Our standard inclusion for shelving was ventilated wired shelving, so we had to upgrade it to melamine shelving. I don't think we could live without this upgrade. for a 1,700 or something for the house throughout, it was a must have.
Kitchen: As I shared earlier, we were quite firm on our decision that unless an upgrade adds additional functionality, we won't be upgrading it. So, we chose everything for kitchen from the standard range which is Matt finish. Here is how it looks:
If you are after a white kitchen, you may think to upgrade to Sheen finish.
Also we didn't upgrade the benchtop, which is Caesarstone Linen, no thickness increase, no waterfall edges. No regrets at all. Exteremely happy with the Linen, it doesn't reveal watermarks easily like the other one we have in our ensuite (Caesarstone Walnut). If you are after low maintenance, Linen is a great choice if it goes with your colour scheme.
Even though we had option, we didn't go for under-mount sink (I know it is very stylish but we love the extra space on the side of our sink). I have seen few of our friends having this under-mount sink, and they kept the washed pans etc inside the other portion of the sink for water drain out! We really didn't want to do that.
Also went with fixed cooker (separate burner and oven) as opposed to free-standing one. The reason being we cook spicy-oily food a lot and cleaning the sides of free standing oven would be painful. Happy with other Fisher & Paykel appliances (Fridge, Dish washer, Washing Machine, Dryer) as well.
Now on the downside, the position of the fixed microwave is not ideal, you have to bend while operating it and it is not AT ALL safe if you have kids. And the switch to turn off the oven is AT THE BACK OF THE Microwave, so you can't easily switch the power off when the device is not in use!! If we could've predicted this earlier, we would've changed this space into a drawer or something, as we had to use a separate microwave set up on the back bench-top anyway. Another option is a Tower-style which can't fit in our tiny kitchen.
Butlers pantry: On the positive side, you have the extra hidden sink which becomes very useful specially when you have guests. But it surely takes out some space for your shelves.
Power Points: In Kitchen, we added 3 double power points (2 on back-bench) and 1 on the side of the island: very useful indeed. Another one is in Butlers Pantry. We have power-points in nearly every corner of the living areas. Decision for placing a Floor lamp or a power connection while doing vacuum becomes easy because of them.
Laundry: Cordova Two has a 'linen' inside the laundry already. So, we didn't add any extra storage space in laundry. And I couldn't agree on using a front-load washer, so couldn't extend the laundry top. No issues so far, with all the the built-ins in the house, additional storage is not required for us at the moment.
Here are some pictures:
I am gonna talk about Living areas this time.
Ceiling Height: We opted for 2550 cm ceilings upgrade. Though unplanned, this ceiling height somehow had given an uniformed look with the window height, recess height and the door heights. I like this height similarity, thank God we didn't go for any higher ceilings, otherwise we wouldn't have known that we needed to increase the heights of windows and doors also to match with 2700 cm ceiling.
Air con: We didn't upgrade the aircon that was included in the package with standard two-zone system. So far it had passed the test for both Heating and Cooling mode over the last months! And even though we used it a lot, the electricity bill is NOT crazy as we expected!
Shelving: Our standard inclusion for shelving was ventilated wired shelving, so we had to upgrade it to melamine shelving. I don't think we could live without this upgrade. for a 1,700 or something for the house throughout, it was a must have.
Kitchen: As I shared earlier, we were quite firm on our decision that unless an upgrade adds additional functionality, we won't be upgrading it. So, we chose everything for kitchen from the standard range which is Matt finish. Here is how it looks:
If you are after a white kitchen, you may think to upgrade to Sheen finish.
Also we didn't upgrade the benchtop, which is Caesarstone Linen, no thickness increase, no waterfall edges. No regrets at all. Exteremely happy with the Linen, it doesn't reveal watermarks easily like the other one we have in our ensuite (Caesarstone Walnut). If you are after low maintenance, Linen is a great choice if it goes with your colour scheme.
Even though we had option, we didn't go for under-mount sink (I know it is very stylish but we love the extra space on the side of our sink). I have seen few of our friends having this under-mount sink, and they kept the washed pans etc inside the other portion of the sink for water drain out! We really didn't want to do that.
Also went with fixed cooker (separate burner and oven) as opposed to free-standing one. The reason being we cook spicy-oily food a lot and cleaning the sides of free standing oven would be painful. Happy with other Fisher & Paykel appliances (Fridge, Dish washer, Washing Machine, Dryer) as well.
Now on the downside, the position of the fixed microwave is not ideal, you have to bend while operating it and it is not AT ALL safe if you have kids. And the switch to turn off the oven is AT THE BACK OF THE Microwave, so you can't easily switch the power off when the device is not in use!! If we could've predicted this earlier, we would've changed this space into a drawer or something, as we had to use a separate microwave set up on the back bench-top anyway. Another option is a Tower-style which can't fit in our tiny kitchen.
Butlers pantry: On the positive side, you have the extra hidden sink which becomes very useful specially when you have guests. But it surely takes out some space for your shelves.
Power Points: In Kitchen, we added 3 double power points (2 on back-bench) and 1 on the side of the island: very useful indeed. Another one is in Butlers Pantry. We have power-points in nearly every corner of the living areas. Decision for placing a Floor lamp or a power connection while doing vacuum becomes easy because of them.
Laundry: Cordova Two has a 'linen' inside the laundry already. So, we didn't add any extra storage space in laundry. And I couldn't agree on using a front-load washer, so couldn't extend the laundry top. No issues so far, with all the the built-ins in the house, additional storage is not required for us at the moment.
Here are some pictures:
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| Cordova Two: HT which became MISC room with Musical instruments, Books |
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