THE WRONG WAY TO DO A HOME RENO
Featuring Kait Day of Nowaday Studio + her home reno experience.
Almost every other day we chat with a potential client who tells us that “they have a guy” who’s ready and willing to start a home reno and all they need is an interior designer to lead the way!
Our response?
“Wait! Stop! Hold up!”
Every reno – whether it’s big or small requires careful planning and realistic timelines. We can’t count the number of times clients have come to us with emergency reno situations or mistakes from DIY projects gone awry. Or, simply put, expecting us to make magic happen with a time frame that doesn’t fit the project scope. Any situation like this is bound to end in frustration and disappointment.
To help illustrate this fact, we’re welcoming our marketing strategist + photographer, Kait Day of Nowaday Studio to the blog to share a little about her experience going about a new home reno… how shall we put this… the wrong way.
Without futher ado…
This past December my partner and I decided (rather impulsively if I’m being honest) to buy a big beautiful fixer upper in Wolseley. We knew the bones were there and we were pretty sure we could transform the space into something perfect for our permanent work-from-home lifestyle. We love the neighbourhood and we love old character homes so an extremely dated kitchen and dingy bathroom didn’t deter us in the slightest.
Our first purchase upon possession of our new home? A shiny, handy crowbar. That’s right. The perfect tool for a few minor demolition projects… or so we thought in the beginning.
The weekend of our possession of the house we had big plans: to rip out the kitchen uppers and peel off some dated, old panelling in our second floor, main bathroom.
Let’s back up here for a second.
When I mentioned “impulsively” bought a house what I mean is: we could afford the house, we had family members who had the home reno know-how, and we were prepared to put in a big investment into the home over a number of years. But definitely not all right away.
Ok back to the crowbar. While I worked away peeling paint off the baseboards on our main floor, I heard a scared voice call down from upstairs. It was my partner informing me that he “may have a made a mistake” while tearing out the panelling in our bathroom.
Along with the panelling, most of the original plaster and lath had also been removed from the walls – all the way down to the studs.
Being complete reno newbies, we knew this was probably bad but we weren’t quite sure how bad.
Our innocent desire to “just quickly pull off the panelling” had now turned into panicked phone calls to parents, and on my end… Debs. A few photos and videos later, we realized we were now looking at a repair that was going to cost us – both in time and money.
Our biggest mistake in all of this was a distinct lack of planning or understanding of the structure of our house. We didn’t understand how plaster worked. Or, apparently, the damage that could be done in an instant by a crowbar. We were also ver unaware of the strategy and space planning necessary for a room as important at a main bathroom.
We didn’t consult with anyone before deciding to pull building materials straight off our walls and we were now left in a situation with an almost unusable main bathroom.
When I shared our plight with Debs, she was quick to run me through the ideal timeline situation that she recommends for all of her clients – one I definitely knew somewhere in my subconscious after working with Design Shop for the past two years. And yet, in my excitement to dive head first into renos of my new home, I somehow forgot that something like a bathroom reno takes time, planning, and MONEY.
If I could go back – I definitely wouldn’t have suggested or agreed with my partner that removing the panelling on our own was a brilliant idea. We’re currently in a situation of trying to budget for a reno we can’t really afford and trying to find contractors, trades, and designers (hello Design Shop team 👋) who can work with us on a non existent timeline. And our bathroom well… you be the judge of our current situation.
I share this story with you for a few reasons – but mostly as a warning to not be like me and enter into a situation that you don’t know anything about with no plan or strategy in place. It is with many regrets that we now use our bathroom daily with walls half torn apart (see above).
Although we’re excited for our updated bathroom, we also now have to wait – on money, trades people, and suppliers – and most importantly on design strategy before we’ll be able to have the bathroom of our dreams. And waiting is ok. But it would have been a lot more palatable if we didn’t have to live in a demo zone every time we take a shower.