Friday, March 13, 2015

My Kitchen Renovation

This was my first ever assessment about renovating. I have never done a renovation before. This is a 2-person team assessment, my partner was Michelle C.. The final grading will be the same for both of us.
The task was to get a kitchen (preferably our own so that we can work conveniently) and find faults and inconvenience in the usage of the kitchen. We were told to contact the person who normally works in that particular kitchen, to ask them and list down the faults of the kitchen that can be renovated reasonably.
Michelle and I decided that we should renovate the kitchen in my new house, since it is plain, small and is basically incomplete (as for the appliances and accessories). We were going to renovate her kitchen but her kitchen has everything already, there is nothing to fix or modify for the better.
So first I took pictures of the kitchen, and we discussed the changes.
So I’ve made the list of points to write down;
Introduction to the existing kitchen
-Describe the placements and existing stuff
-Materials of cabinets and counters
-Materials of flooring and walls
-**Surroundings
Problems
-Dull colour of cabinets
-Dull pattern of cabinets and counters
-Lack of lighting in general **because maid/cook is old so it’s a eyesight problem
-Small fridge space, lacking storage for products that need to be cooled/frozen
-Microwave covers cooking workspace and wires are allover the place, dangerous incase water splashes from sink
-(not a problem but can be upgraded)Sink does not give out fast running water and makes noises when washing because of the quality of the material
-Storage is okay but can be useful to expand more
-Doorless passageway cause bugs and other insects to come in when food is on the counter or the person is cooking, also useless access and can be optimised in another way
 -Dispenser is blocking the way
Solutions and additions
-Rearranged and added cabinets so that the overall look is not plain and boring, added cabinets to make more room for more things like blender, mixer, bowls and other various items
-Changed the colour of the cabinets to white to make it look fresh, stripped the HPL finishing and added a frame and finished it again with better quality HPL
  -Addition of backlight for the counter on the back of cabinets and also inside cabinets when the cabinets are open
-Increased fridge space by moving counter 1 out of the way
-Added a hover overhead shelf exclusive for microwave so counter and cooking space is much wider, including more space to store ingredients like spices and bottles
-Change the model of the sink, a spray hose sink(aka pull-down faucets) which is a turnable faucet with a longer depth to the basin, use a more high quality sink which is stronger and silent, the lower 18- gauge
-Cemented the passageway and added a small window for air circulation and also for refreshing the mind when cooking and looking for ideas
-Added a special block for dispenser. makes it look more put togther
Budget
+additional cabinets and counters 
+new fridge (- old fridge)
+Blender 
+cement for covering wall
+window 
+Backlight for inside cabinet and below cabinet
+New sink with pull-down faucets 18-gauge
Grand Total Calculation
Here is a video of the before after, the whole explaination is in my Prezi presentation, which will be in here.