Me and my husband got married in January 2016. Prior to our wedding day, we only got approx 8 months to renovate & move to our new apartment home. It was a long and fun journey, you know.. planning for wedding & new home at the same time.. mini heart attacks here and there for sure.
Long story short, we decided to do a full renovation. Although our apartment building is old on the outside & interior wise (classic roman themed), but overall it’s pretty legit- meaning that the developers who made the apartment really took their time using all quality stuffs, not like those new developers who prefer quantity over quality.
So moving on to the renovating & decorating part – which is the most exciting part! 🙂 My design taste is leaning towards industrial, scandinavian/nordic, dark bold colors (grey/black), marble, brass, dim lights, coffee/lounge ambiance, and loft kind vibes. While william’s taste is more like wood/earthy tones, light & bright colors, airy, simple and functional. So after tons of disagreements & cat fights, we decided to act like adults, put our negotiation skills to use, and try to find the middle ground (you’ll definitely learn to accept & let go your ego at this stage lol)
Here’s the before pictures…
(Pictures above: living room, kitchen, master bedroom)
Some of our major hauls we did to the apartment:
- Extended the ceiling height for the entire space – this changed the vibe immediately, making it more spacey and flowy.
- Made deep ceiling cove lights on both bedrooms, living room, and dining area (we use the maximum height).
- Changed the marble flooring to hardwood flooring (except the bathrooms, kitchen & laundry area)
- Merged 2 rooms into 1 master bedroom – my dream walking closet came true!
- The kitchen space used to be confined with frame walls & it has that ugly retro tiles (eww). When we opened up the kitchen area, the apartment looks bigger instantly!
(Pictures above: kitchen, bathroom, dining area)
The renovation ended up making it quite on time. Although we had to spend the first week sleeping at my mom-in-laws’ house due to our bed frame’s late delivery, we managed to move to our apartment the following week.
As a new apartment-home owner, I’m glad we’re living in an apartment. I think it’s the best way to live as a newlywed couple, considering I’m not ready for any “maid drama” (indo peeps, you know what I’m talking about right? haha). Â Currently we have 2 on-call maids who come once/twice a week & work for 4 hrs a day. Later when we have kids, we’ll def have a maid or two, but for now, privacy is number one. I think that on our first year of marriage, we need to settle down first with our spouse, be an independent home/apartment owner, and have enough privacy for both of us. Why waste our energy and time with something that isn’t our priorities, right? Try to live simple but effective at the same time.
Anyways, I’ll post the “after” pictures & my list of vendors on my next post. Stay tuned!
-JL
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