The Upside Down House

The last few weeks have seen some big visual changes to the house; tiled bathrooms, kitchen worktop, painted walls and (the biggest of all) the new roof.

After the early gains made with tiling the bathrooms, Jon and Shaun decided they weren’t happy with the alignment of the tile for the shower recesses, so stripped the tiles off.  They then decided the quality of the plasterboard they’d used wasn’t up to scratch, so stripped that off too and replaced it with a tried-and-tested option.  Such commitment to quality is extremely reassuring and much appreciated.

Together with the tiling suppliers, we’re now working through an issue with irregular tile cutting in the shower room (the small ones by the window).  When this is sorted, the tiling will be complete…

Templating complete, the Silestone worktop was made in three sections and fitted in the kitchen…

When the corners weren’t quite as rounded as we wanted…

… The nice people from LBS Stone came back and made them more ‘small person head friendly’… 

Having settled-upon colours, the decorator has been busy getting mist-coats and first coats on (this shot shows the light and mid-grey colours)…

While there will be a little more colour in the kids’ rooms…

And then there’s the roof… fitted over five days by a team from Lincoln.  One of the more technologically-advanced aspects of the build, James at CDMS discovered a more contemporary alternative to Zinc at this year’s Grand Designs Live exhibition.  Manufactured by Tata Steel, it has the same standing-seam design that appealed with Zinc, but is produced to tighter tolerances, giving a more uniform finish (oh, and it’s also cheaper!).  Some more techie details here…

After the main roof sections were laid (two days), the guttering, drains, soffits and eaves were put into place…

From a colour perspective, the plasterboard added to the outside of the extension gives an insight into what the house will look like after it’s been rendered (this week) – offset by the anthracite steel roof and aluminium window frames…

Both Upside Downers are out of the country this week, so there will doubtless be some big changes by the time the holiday’s over.