The Home Improvements Thread (2)

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ToxicBunny said:
Formica counter tops are great for their price... no questions about it really. They are just limiting in some ways, but if you have a relatively standard kitchen countertop requirement then they fit perfectly and they have a great range of colour options.
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This. They definitely won't be suitable for every situation out there as you pointed out but I'm ultimately glad that they worked for our needs. I've just realized that they probably wouldn't look great on a larger square surface (such as a kitchen island) unless one could make the joins as seamless as possible.
 
martin said:
This. They definitely won't be suitable for every situation out there as you pointed out but I'm ultimately glad that they worked for our needs.
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And also, depending on how tiling etc is done around them, its also relatively easy to swap them out at a later date for Granite or quartz if you wanted to do that....
 
martin said:
We considered Quartz countertops (as well as granite and some other recycled material whose name I can't recall) but had to 'settle' for Formica countertops. We have a large rectangular kitchen and our countertops run along three of the four kitchen walls which is close to a 15 meter run in total. Our cheapest quote came in at around 60K (including installation) if memory serves which was more than three-quarters of our kitchen budget. The Formica tops cost us 8K (including installation). Now that I've seen how the Formica tops are installed, I'm pretty confident I could do that myself in the future.

I was initially disappointed that Formica was one our only affordable option but honestly it's been great so far. The colour we chose contrasts perfectly with our cupboards. I was also surprised that everyone we've shown the kitchen to has loved it so far. I guess I was expecting a little more snobbery in that regard.

I was worried that the surfaces would damage easily but as long as we keep our cutting and chopping on a cutting board it looks like these will last us a long time. And honestly, I could replace the Formica tops on a yearly basis for the next five years and I still wouldn't reach the cheapest Quartz quote we were given.

I do realize that Quartz or Granite is still the superior option and it's obviously still nicer looking compared to Formica and other cheaper options but it's definitely not as bad of an alternative as I initially thought.
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Wow. My kitchen will be 6mx5m and we are also going to use 3 walls and that will need some serious countertops space. Not looking forward to the quotation for that.
 
Fuma said:
Wow. My kitchen will be 6mx5m and we are also going to use 3 walls and that will need some serious countertops space. Not looking forward to the quotation for that.
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My kitchen is about the same size as yours.... but I only have 2 walls to work with.. but be different my son.... Don't stay within the realms of what you think is normal.

I have a quartz Island, but the other counter top is french oak...
c65ce671-3e9b-4d8a-97bc-452ff8fb3d81.jpg

932adf14-e358-4ec1-a782-3756b58d8d00.jpg
(apologies for the poor quality images, they were taken when the kitchen had just finished being installed)

Oh and for @martin , those cupboards are all formica covered.. so what you have on your counter tops are on all the cupboard doors.
 
ToxicBunny said:
Hunt around though...

My island at home is 2.7m x 1.5m with waterfall sides and I was hit at just around R30k for that...

I would suggest get in touch with a company called Stone Connection and see what their pricing would be on a quartz countertop. I used this specific quartz material from them : http://www.stoneconnection.co.za/product/colonata-2/
Colonatta-5-200x200.jpg
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LOL. Actually it is same company, same material(colonata). They have offices in Pretoria where I live.
 
Fuma said:
LOL. Actually it is same company, same material(colonata). They have offices in Pretoria where I live.
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Then you definitely don't want to talk to caeserstone or pro-quartz... their stuff is 3 times the price of Stone Connection....
 
Fuma said:
Wow. My kitchen will be 6mx5m and we are also going to use 3 walls and that will need some serious countertops space. Not looking forward to the quotation for that.
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Mine is 8.8mx4m. In addition to that I also have a smaller scullery with two countertops in there as well.
 
Fuma said:
I'm depressed now.:crying:
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Dude... just to make it 10x worse for you.... I took nearly 3 years to get my kitchen designed/built/installed.... It was the longest project of my life but at the end of it, the financial strain it put me under has been worth it. I absolutely adore cooking in my kitchen.

I was also hard arsed with the 3 different kitchen companies that I worked with..... They were all so stuck in their ways of what they would design that I ended up finding a kitchen cupboard fabricator who would work to my design.

But I would very definitely say you should play way outside of the box with a kitchen the size that you have... get away from the countertop space mantra and all that.. if you can fit a 2.7m x 1.2m island in the kithchen you really don't need much more counter space than that. This might be presumptuous and all that, but post a rough plan of the kitchen space and how it relates to the rest of the house and the outside and maybe we can all brainstorm a few ideas for you that would end up saving you some money and give you options into the future, and still end up with a stunning kitchen.
 
ToxicBunny said:
This might be presumptuous and all that, but post a rough plan of the kitchen space and how it relates to the rest of the house and the outside and maybe we can all brainstorm a few ideas for you that would end up saving you some money and give you options into the future, and still end up with a stunning kitchen.
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I'll take you up on that - in the near future. (If i may)
 
ToxicBunny said:
My kitchen is about the same size as yours.... but I only have 2 walls to work with.. but be different my son.... Don't stay within the realms of what you think is normal.

I have a quartz Island, but the other counter top is french oak...

...

Oh and for @martin , those cupboards are all formica covered.. so what you have on your counter tops are on all the cupboard doors.
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That's looking great so far! Two other options we considered for countertops were concrete and large tiles. The concrete quote turned out to be more pricey than the Formica tops as far as I recall but ultimately we didn't feel that it complemented the look we were going far. I can't remember why we decided against tiles.
 
ToxicBunny said:
Dude... just to make it 10x worse for you.... I took nearly 3 years to get my kitchen designed/built/installed.... It was the longest project of my life but at the end of it, the financial strain it put me under has been worth it. I absolutely adore cooking in my kitchen.

I was also hard arsed with the 3 different kitchen companies that I worked with..... They were all so stuck in their ways of what they would design that I ended up finding a kitchen cupboard fabricator who would work to my design.

But I would very definitely say you should play way outside of the box with a kitchen the size that you have... get away from the countertop space mantra and all that.. if you can fit a 2.7m x 1.2m island in the kithchen you really don't need much more counter space than that. This might be presumptuous and all that, but post a rough plan of the kitchen space and how it relates to the rest of the house and the outside and maybe we can all brainstorm a few ideas for you that would end up saving you some money and give you options into the future, and still end up with a stunning kitchen.
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Hmmmm. It is a new build and I'm still discussing with the builder (bank financed) and I hope they do not use builder grade material. I have PC items money from the loan to work with.
 
HunterNW said:
I'll take you up on that - in the near future. (If i may)
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More than welcome to dude.... We can all brainstorm some stuff...

martin said:
That's looking great so far! Two other options we considered for countertops were concrete and large tiles. The concrete quote turned out to be more pricey than the Formica tops as far as I recall but ultimately we didn't feel that it complemented the look we were going far. I can't remember why we decided against tiles.
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That was 2 years ago :)... kitchen is pretty well settled in now actually. Concrete counter tops are awesome in the right space, but they are as pricey as cheap granite as far as I remember and also still a bit of an art form in this country.
 
Fuma said:
Hmmmm. It is a new build and I'm still discussing with the builder (bank financed) and I hope they do not use builder grade material. I have PC items money from the loan to work with.
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New build? Then you're a lucky man... you can almost dictate the way the kitchen works instead of trying to shoe horn it into an existing space... but unless you lean hard on the builder, they will install pretty generic designed stuff. It will look nice but it won't necessarily be the WOW you are probably after.

Don't forget the important things like drainage, plumbing, gas (if you want to use it) and power....
 
I should have started building but due to delays (estate delaying things, COVID, etc), I'm still going through the process. Fortunately I managed to settle some debt so that I can have some cash to have the stuff I want if the pc amount does not cover it.
 
Fuma said:
Fortunately I managed to settle some debt so that I can have some cash to have the stuff I want if the pc amount does not cover it.
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Soft-close runners and hinges added an extra 4K to our quote and I have zero regrets.
 
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