All In All It's Just Another......

One of the key features of the reno was completed this weekend and I would have never of thought I'd get so excited over a brick wall. We're trying to get a bit of an industrial theme happening and one of the key elements of the brief was having a feature brick wall. The look I wanted was similar to the exposed brick we had in our apartment in the East Village. A sort of red clay style brick. After countless trips to used brick yards all over Sydney I finally found a material I was looking for.

The construction started two weeks ago and it was amazing as they managed to get through three quarters of the wall in one day. To give you an idea of size it's four meters wide by five meters tall. It's a feature in the void area and something we hope will break up the clean white lines in other parts of the room.

We'd designed in an English bond on every ten rows. That's where the head of the brick (short end) is exposed. I did have to Google that when it was first mentioned. Also put in a few white painted bricks to break it up a bit.

The final touch was done today with a pressure hose clean. We didnt end up acid washing it as was afraid this would remove to much of the character from the bricks. We absolutely love where we ended up with it. Almost feels like it could have been there 100 years. A big thanks to the bricklayer, Ashton, he's done a superb job.

The bricks in the yard. The two middle pallets and half the back one at the top are the bricks we used.

And we're off with the first row of bricks

And more

And even more

Not a bad days effort making it 3/4's of the way up

Almost done, one small corner to g

And we're done (without the clean)

 And now introducing the final product

Week 7 and 8 - The Start of the Frame

It's been a really productive fortnight onsite. Now that the steelwork is up it enabled the team to start on the frame. A run of pretty decent, albeit hot weather has enabled work to move along at a steady pace. During week seven the downstairs frame and first floor went up and during week eight the upstairs frame and roof joists were started. It's really cool as you can get much more of a perspective of the build now. 

The single most exciting thing to happen this fortnight was the brick wall went up. I'll save a separate blog to go into intricate detail on this topic.

The 'district vistas' from upstairs

Future ensuite window

Sunset over the flour mills from our bedroom window.

Week 6 - Metal Work

We've finally risen out of the ground. While the weather was pretty crap last week the builders managed to get the metal frame up. The exposed steel beam is there in all its glory. This week they'll be focussing on getting the timber up. Finger's crossed the weather improves as it's been a shocking couple of weeks. 

Day 26

Day 28 - The first of the steel

Day 29

Week 4 and 5 Reno - The Slab

I've been a bit distracted with a few other things of late so haven't had much of a chance to put up a blog on the house. We've had great progress over the last fortnight with the slab going down and all the dirt getting removed. It was a pretty bad run with weather so the site has turned into a massive mud pit. It's all the more exciting as this week the steel comes so it means the project is really going to be getting off the ground. 

Day 18

Day 19

Day 20

Day 21

Day 22

Day 23

Day 24

Day 25

Slab going down

It's the biggest mixer ever

I couldn't help myself

Week 3 Reno - Excavation and Foundations

Another big week of progress on the house. The demo revealed that ground level under the house was roughly 40 cm's higher than expected. This caused a few last minute changes but were sorted by the great team on the job. Once the demo was completed and ground level flattened it started to pour. This created muddy puddles Peppa would have loved (man I must be reading that book to Flynn to much). The place turned into a quagmire. In addition the dirt removal truck got stuck at another job and delayed getting our dirt away. In the mean time the slab foundations went down so we've currently got a bobcat and digger trapped in our back yard. Am sure Master Flynn would be happy to keep it that way. Once the slab is laid and dried they'll be able to get it all out and clean the site up.

Big week coming up. Got the engineer in on Tuesday to do the first of his certifications and the big pour happens on Wednesday. Cannot believe how fast it's going. 

Day 12

Day 13

Day 15

Muddy puddles

Trapped digger

Week 2 Reno - Demo's Continue

Another busy week onsite with continued demolition. The focus of this week was getting the masonry demolished. It's really happening now and at the moment all that is left is a big pile of dirt. The architect, engineer and builder are meeting onsite on Monday to discuss the requirements around a concrete upturn on the neighbors property. Fingers crossed something not to major is needed here.

This week we'll be focussing on some dirt removal and starting to dig the foundations. The first of the concrete gets laid near the end of the week.

Day 5

Day 6

Day 7

Day 8

Day 9