Renovations-One or Two Details

Of course, with a big house there are always details to attend to. One of them for us was finding antique window locks. Called sapos, or frogs, these spring loaded locks are put at the top of the window where they ensure that the window can't open. You pull a thin chain to open them. The modern models are pretty ugly so we've been looking for antique ones for ages. We found 4 in Valparaiso a couple of weeks ago and two in Santiago last week. Added to the 7 we already had we needed around 12 more. And they're really not easy to get hold of. Muy escasos was the phrase we heard most.

For that reason, this morning we found ourselves in the 8th Circle of Hell, otherwise known as La Feria Municipal de Belloto (the other side of Quilpue). This place is a huge semi-outdoor market that sells absolutely everything ever made anywhere in the world. It's like the Persa de Bio-Bio in Santiago, but even more of a nightmare-huge crowds, traffic jams, noise and obvious pickpockets galore.

We didn't find any sapos.

We decided on the way back to drop by the antique market here in Valpo to see if more had arrived since our last visit. Jackpot! We found one and then, just a couple of stalls down, we found...wait for it...11 more. Through a huge stroke of luck, we now have all the sapos that we need. Another little detail ticked off the list.

Finally, here's a photo of our wood burner. Like in the kitchen, we designed the tiles. I'm almost looking forward to winter now, summer's getting boring. I love being inside next to the fire when there's a huge winter storm outside.

Renovations-Finished II

So here are the rest of the photos I promised (and ahead of schedule too-the late afternoon light was really nice).

This is the master bedroom-the tube in the corner is where the chimney/flue from the wood burner downstairs will pass. The floor in this bedroom is rauli, for which I have no English translation. It's the only room that doesn't have Douglas Fir floorboards-we ran out.



The white door leads to a little triangular en-suite.


The view that awaits us every morning.


The only change to the layout of the house was cutting a large room in half (and adding a bit of corridor) to create a third bedroom and a small reception area with recycled oak beams on view next to the kitchen (which is upstairs).






The kitchen isn't quite finished. The window obviously needs its double glazing (long, boring story) and there'll be a work top all along the right hand wall where the drawer unit you see will also go. The kitchen cabinets are handmade from recycled oak. And if you click on the renovations label, you'll find a post that shows the floor tiles being handmade.


This is the second bedroom with en-suite. The photos are so yellow because the wall on the left is painted that colour and the late afternoon sun streams through the windows and make the entire room look yellow.



Finally, the skylight looking up through the roof.


Once the kitchen is done and we've got all our stuff moved in (and tidied up), I'll post more photos.

Renovations-Finished...

I've been away for the past few days down in Santa Cruz, looking for a nice vineyard in Chile for some clients. We got back yesterday after putting another 1000km on the car...my back's totally killing me but it was a pretty successful trip and we also got to meet up with a friend of ours as well, which was cool.

Anyway, the house is finished. Today, the hot water will be connected and the central heating will be completed next week (we're missing a radiator, not too important in summer). Most of upstairs is a still covered in cardboard to protect the floors but downstairs is empty, so here are a few photos. More to come over the weekend. You can see the stages of the renovation process by clicking on the 'renovations' label at the bottom of this post or in the sidebar.

The two main rooms downstairs:


The white doors are going to be stripped back to the wood, like the windows above them, but we're going to do that in a few weeks once we've got another place to make a mess:


The ceiling molds and cornices are all new plaster except the corner 'faces' (there's a man in one room and a woman in another), which are the original papier mache ones. We made plaster molds to replace a couple that were too damaged to re-use.





I already have my office in place with a view of the hills:


The entrance hall:


Downstairs corridor and staircase:





The three bathrooms are all the same design. This is the easiest to take a photo of as the other two are even more triangular:


I'll have more upstairs photos and the kitchen uploaded sometime over the weekend.

Renovations: Finished...Ma o Meno

Remember when we didn't have a house, but a war zone?


Well, today the builders and painters are leaving. At last. Over the weekend the floors will have their last two coats of varnish and on Monday the house will be done, with the exception of fixing mirrors, putting up a couple of lights and putting up a shower curtain pole. By this time next week, the floor varnish will be hard enough to then move all our things in. Yey..!

I'll post photos on Monday or Tuesday. So you'll have a whole, sleepless weekend thinking about what it's going to look like.

It's actually only been 8 months since we started the work. 8 months to rebuild entirely a huge old house. It's been tiring and stressful at times, but that's the work we've chosen to do. And we do it kind of well...the quality of the work is way higher than anything that's been seen here in private home renovations in Valparaiso before and we did it all for 50% less than it should have really cost.

So this is the part when I say that we can do this for you here in Valparaiso. We are involved in loft conversions in Valparaiso and other projects that will help make Valparaiso one of the Southern Cone's coolest cities to travel to and in which to live and work. We also offer a full real estate consulting service in Chile. So, for Valparaiso, Chile real estate and property-you know where to come.

Apologies for the outrageous and none-to-subtle advertising...it's just that I'm proud of the work we're doing here and want others to join us in this amazing city. If you're looking for something different in your life, then Valparaiso's a great option.

Before and After...A Big Red House

The angle's not quite right but until I get to know the owner of the house on the corner of Lautaro Rosas and Miramar, I'm never going to be able to get it perfect.

Update: I had another photo and I think the angle's better. It's still not prefect though. It's the first photo under 2008.


1907


2008






The photos were taken from the third floor suite at the Zero Hotel

Renovations...so close...

We're so close to finishing the house-it's the last details that take so damn long unfortunately. Anyway, the floors are being polished, the paint is being painted and the bathrooms are almost all completely tiled. Sometime next week we're going to have a massive clear-out of all the materials, scaffolding etc so i'll be able to take some proper photos and post them then.

Despite the fact that we're desperate to finish and move in upstairs, we're going to miss the everyday work of renovations as it's something we both really enjoy. So it's lucky that our company, that specialises in real estate in Valparaiso and Chile has bought a beautiful, but slightly crumbly, property 2 minutes walk away from us that we're going to convert into two large luxury loft apartments in Valparaiso. With sea views and parking. And the location is incredible.

It's going to be the best quality Valparaiso renovacion patrimonial project Valparaiso's seen and we're really kind of excited about being able to do it. Almost all of these loft projects that Valparaiso has seen have been really, really poor quality. The finished apartments are almost all small, cheap and crappy. Not places anyone would want to spend more than a few days at a time. We're going to do a high quality job and create apartments where people could actually live. The idea is to help attract people to spend more time here and not just use the apartments as mere holiday homes. More details in a couple of weeks...

In the meantime, here are three photos of the outside of our house from before, during and after...

Renovations...getting there...

As i suspected, we're about 1 month behind schedule as the ground floor renovations took around 6 weeks longer than expected. We've caught up a little but not enough to be finished in time for New Year. Still, we're finished enough to have a party upstairs (where the view of the fireworks is pretty cool). Here are a few photos showing how things are looking now. The floorboards are down, the cornices and moldings are in place, the first couple of coats of paint are done and the glass is being put in the windows. Almost there...








The office and living room behind


The living room


A mini-living room upstairs leaving the (re-done) oak structure on display



These are the cornices that we've put in the passageways of the house


And these in the living areas


And the centre pieces for the living areas


Views from the yet to be finished roof...

Renovations-Advances

Things are coming along nicely upstairs. We're around a month behind schedule by my reckoning as the work on the ground floor over the winter was more extensive than we first thought it would be. Anyway, we'll be around 90% finished by Christmas and then will put the finishing touches to everything at the beginning on January when we'll also, finally, get our hands on the rest of our furniture and belongings from Buenos Aires that we haven't seen for almost a year...

At the moment, the ground floor upstairs is being decorated, the upstairs is having the plasterboard installed, the kitchen cabinets are being made (we're having recycled oak cabinets) and the floorboards will be relaid starting this week. The ceiling molds and cornices have been made and are waiting in Santiago. Once the double glazing and kitchen and bathroom tiles are finished later this week we'll have it all sent over and installed.

In the meantime, here are some photos of the exterior, all painted its shiny red colour. Within the next couple of weeks, all the windows will be installed and painted white to contrast better with the red.

I'll take photos of the interior upstairs sometime this week before my trip over to Argentina. Looks like Buenos Aires is going to be on my itinerary as i've got to take care of a couple of things over there so Robert and Fruitboy, if you fancy a beer or a coffee then let me know. I reckon i'll be there around this time next week.

Renovations-making the floor

Just before leaving to head up to San Pedro we had to head over to the factory where they make the old-style mosaic tiles we're going to use in the kitchen and bathrooms. We'd miscalculated the square metres and had ordered a couple of hundred thousand pesos worth too much. Whilst there, the saleswomen asked if we wanted to go see the tiles we'd designed (you get to choose the design and then the colours). We'd read in the leaflet blurb that they were all 'hand made' but assumed this was more along the lines of a person setting the machine and then a conveyor belt doing the rest. We were wrong...every single tile is handmade from scratch. Here are a few photos taken from the work floor (taken from my phone so the quality's not fantastic).








Each tile is made using a frame and paint is poured in by hand





The finished product