As you can see from the pictures the hall is just beginning to take shape. The walls have been painted downstairs and a plaster cornice will be fitted throughout all the rooms downstairs, except for the small bathroom which has been tiled to the ceiling.
The following photographs are of my stairs. As you can see I decided on ash as I love the different tones that this light wood can give. My floor panels downstairs will match this well as they are made of acer (klon).
Unfortunately everything is still in the process of being worked upon and consequently all the photos you're going to see will show ongoing work, without anything in particular being finished or attractive to look at. One wonders what has actually been done...and where has the money gone to?
What can be seen clearly now, are that the changes made to the study downstairs have resulted in substantial changes upstairs.
I decided right away to have only two bedrooms and one bathroom upstairs as I am a large man and like to have plenty of space around me. The house is my retirement home and as I live alone, I have made changes that suit me. This means that my study downstairs will act as an additional guest bedroom making three large bedrooms in the house.
The bathroom is large and will have a large bath, with possibly a shower over it. So far I have changed my mind a few times as to what I should do there. It's not an easy space to design as the sloping roof limits the various possibilities that can be chosen. If I was a small person then there would be less of a problem, however, I'm tall and I don't want to position a bath or a toilet in a space where I can't move.
So far I had looked at corner baths measuring 185 x 135 cm in size with massage functions and enough space to accommodate two people or one large person. In the meantime I started to hear that these baths require to have far more maintenance and can be troublesome to run. This, for an outlay of 12000 PLN, did not seem to be the direction to go in, so for the moment I’m looking at a standard rectangular, Riho Lusso 200 x 90 cm bath, which is 44 cm deep, and is currently on special offer at 1489 PLN. with legs and waste plug.
A number of accessories are available such as a head rest and handles, and a four piece battery system, including taps for hot and cold, a mixer unit and handheld showerhead built into the bath.
The money I save on buying this should leave enough for a very good shower with all the fancy additions you can think of.
I forgot to say that this New Year did not start off well for me.... I went to a great New Year party...the first in this country for 31 years! Unfortunately it was spoilt by the news that some 'mindless' idiots decided to shear off 15 posts that had been erected and sunk into a concrete base before Christmas. We had left them without putting the wire netting on in order to allow the concrete to set properly with the onset of hard frosts. Obviously fired up with booze, their vandalism has cost me an additional 2500PLN to get back to where I started before Christmas.Yesterday I went to OBI to get new posts,netting, a double gate and a single entrance gate. Now we have to wait for some decent weather to remove the sheared posts embeded in concrete and to set the new posts in fresh, frost free, concrete.
Meanwhile, I have been busy painting......It seems to be never ending......I have put down some base white coats and applied the first colour today! I have a pleasant light tone of brown for the open-plan hallway which leads from the front door to the foot of the stairs.
The walls around the staircase are having a rough plaster coat applied and I will be painting that area with a DEKORAL paint known as Ekspresja, from the Eva Minge collection.
This is an exciting time, as you impose your own personality onto a home...for better or worse...One thing is for sure, some people will love your choices while others will detest them. You'll never be the same after showing what you've done!!
Reading other people's blogs here in Poland I think the comments get over-personal at times...so don't be put off!! At the end of the day it's your house, and as long as your comfortable...who cares? You're not designing a showhouse!
