If you think that “the complete make-over’s” are only for old houses or units – think again!
Few decades ago Domain Apartments went through a massive transformation – it was converted from an office building to an apartment block.
Now the time came for a new massive interior refurbishment for this block of units – a new paint, tile, carpet, new everything! The 80’s interior of pink and brass metal is gone. It is now replaced by an absolutely stylish colour scheme of olive green, dark red, and neutrals. What a difference!
This month we
did some interior painting at stunning La Corniche on Milsons Point. We do a lot of up-market
projects, but this must be the most unique of all!!! It looks very subtle from
outside, but this is called “privacy”!
Out of
respect to owner’s privacy I have not made any interior photos. But the view is
so great, I rather put outside photos anyway. It’s just across a cul-de-sac
from the best Harbour view ever, 10 meters from the ferry! You could do fishing
from the balcony!
On a design
note – finally there is a building that has a beautiful garage!!! I always
wonder – why they do build nice main entries and ugly concrete garages? Most of
people only enter the building through the garage and into the lift. They
rarely see their main foyer. Garage design should get much more attention!
...And
update...
Sydney Morning
Herald had featured this property as top 5 apartment blocks in Australia as Apartments you can't buy into"! They are too good to be sold, no matter what the money are
offered. According to SMH despite constant offers to the owners the last sale
here was in 2002, andthe gossip is that the mystery buyer who then bought 2 of 5 apartments in
this block paying 15milions for each was John Travolta! How
about that?!
This must be the longest projects i was involved in!
This Mosman house just went through 16months of major renovation and extension. The owner was pregnant when we started the project. And now her daughter already big enough to run around the house!
Of cause we did not worked continuously here. We were just coming from time to time for a week or so to do a section of the house between other traders. Glad to see it finished!
This waterfront apartment block on Bondi Beach is undergoing a major refurbishment inside/out. Most of outside work is finished and scaffolds are coming off in a next week.
Taylor’s College and Charles Sturt University at Darlinghurst call us again for another maintenance painting. This time most of classroom needed a fresh coat of paint. All work here must be done over weekends. So each Monday morning the college is fresh and clean and all furniture and equipment is in places.
This place is like a large maze! You navigate it with the map! They use 9 different colours and it took me almost a whole day just to mark which colour going to which classroom.
Oleksandra, our manager, for took part in a Pink Ribbon Ride and a group of us from Ol ‘Painting went to support her and to watch the ride start.
728bikes were officially registered. But they count almost 1,000 bikes at a carpark before the ride started. You should hear the road when thy all took off! People on streets along the ride were lining up to watch bikes passing. What an incredible event!
This is a very-very typical project. We have at least one of those every week.
This house went through a quick upgrade before it was rented out. Just a usual things – get rid of pink and paint in neutral colour, paint kitchen cupboards to bring them back to life, refresh porch and front windows. Little things like this can be done quickly and they really change the house appearance.
Spider boom lifts are amazing new type of lifts that can reach virtually anywhere. They come in few types and sizes. Usually they are just 1.1m wide when not operational and can go throguh the doorway. But when fully set up they can reach up to 50m height and up to 35 mitres to the side! I absolutely adore them!
Update:
Spider boom lift were such a disappointment! Not happy at all.Click here to read my review.
I had a long day today - started at 3 am with washing the ground floor of this Chemist shop on Bathurst St in Sydney CBD. Like most of a city this street is very busy and only gets quiter for few hours before sunrise. So usually we wash fasades between 3am and 6am midweek.
City buildings get filthy quickly. We do a regular washing for a number of city buildings, ussually every 2-6 months.
Guys from the “Inside Strata” – magazine published by the Institute of Strata Title Management (ISTM) liked our story and will publish it in October or December issue. “Strata Living” is distributed to over 1,300 ISTM members. This is a good start!
Ol’ Painting website received a funky makeover. We included lots of information about who we, what we do, some recent projects and testimonials. We created a page about our “Mt Kilimanjaro for Ovarian Cancer Cure” fundraised. Now it is easy to just refer to it when talking to publishers or supporters what exactly are we doing.
Last few weeks were busy writing editorials and webpages about our fundraiser. It all has to be approved by the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation before we can use it. So we could not do much actually promoting our fundraiser. But hopefully everything will be finalised this week, so we can actually start working on raising funds.
Weekends are the busiest time at Ol’ Painting. It’s the most convenient time for many clients to meet to arrange a quote. We always have a couple of strata title projects and we usually paint unit doors on weekends. Also most of offices have to be painted over weekend, so they continue operate as usual during a week.
Last two weekends we were doing panting for “Beanbah” strata-titled office building at Macquarie St in Sydney CBD. It hosts many busy solicitor and doctors offices. It is only closed on Sunday. This is when we had to schedule our work. By Monday morning everything has to be cleaned, all our staff taken away, so building can operate as usual.
“power hill walking” – 5 time a week. We load our backpacks with 25-30kg dumbbells, put on our trekking socks and boots, and we go for a power walk up a down a very steep section of Riverview St at Lane Cove as quickly as we can. We do 5 laps up and down a street each day.
I wonder what residents think of these “bushwalkers” passing their windows 10 times within an hour!
Right now we are finalising our plan of actions, going through all paperwork with the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation, negotiate a registration of a separate event with Everyday Hero site, developing branded stationary, emails and updating our website.
We are flat out with our painting work right now. So our fundraising will take a little free time left from our evenings and weekends. But it is very exiting!
Our second terrace makeover this month. This one is in Paddington.
Dulux colour consultant picked a gorgeous grey for walls. But balcony railings were specified in dark charcoal and this was making house look very serious and official. The owners did not like it. So we paint it back in white. It is much better this way. It makes the house look light and funky. It really suits the lovely young family living here!
I don't normally talk much about, but 3 years ago my mum was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. She lived just 9 more months. It’s hard to watch a person you love dying! I sincerely hope that none of me readers will go through the same loss!
1 in 70 Australians women will develop ovarian cancer before the age of 85. Only 42% will survive after 5 years. So we decided to help to get this cure quicker!
In February 2010 our Ol’ Painting team – me and Oleksandra, will climb Mt Kilimanjaro to raise money for the Ovarian Cancer Research. At 5,896m (19,344ft), “Kili” is the highest pick in Africa and one of the world largest free-standing mountains. We promise to work our guts out, fight the weather, altitude sickness and anything else on our way to the top. In exchange we ask for your donation to the Ovarian Cancer Research!
I’ll post updates on fundraising, planning and training this blog for our sponsors and friends to read. Wish us a good luck!
“45 minutes in the water? How cold is it you said?” I asked James, Calypso desk hand. “8 degrees. But as long as there are sharks around you wouldn’t feel any cold! No need to worry” he smiled and pored a large scoop of a tuna blood in water. Few seconds later a dark shadow of a 6-meters shark appeared from the depth of the water and glided pass the boat! The first shark was already here!
We are on board of Calypso – a legendary Australian boat involved in shark research with CSIRO, many international studies and a host of many shark documentaries. During few months a year they can take passengers for a shark cage diving near remote Neptune Island in South Australia. So this is our chance to see a great white shark close in its environment!
“This is our new cage! We just got it last month!” said captain proudly. Wait a second... First, what happened to the old cage? Second, why your new cage is already welded in few places, scratched all over and has dents as if someone hit it with a huge hummer? But the cage is ready. It is time to dive.
We checked our gear and jumped in icy water. We grouped in a cage looking all around us enviously. But there was nothing. 5 minutes passed. We looked at each other shrugging shoulders. Did that shark left? What shell we do?
And then, in a fraction of a second a huge 6-meters great white appeared from nowhere, swam just centimetres away from our cage and disappeared as quickly as it came! There was no sound, no wave. It came back in few seconds and started to circle the cage coming closer each time. Four smaller 4-5 meters sharks joined her shortly.
The boat crew kept sharks entertained occasional poring tuna blood in water and throwing large chunks of fish around the cage. So sharks showed no real interest in us.
Sharks were magnificent! The massive bodies moved through the water effortlessly in a steady tempo. We watched them gliding pass our cage in fascination. The scene was so quite and unreal we almost forgot about a danger. I had an eagre to touch the shark’s body as she came pass the cage, just to make sure this is real.
But I was quickly put back to senses when one of shark suddenly turned and hit out cage so strong we all were thrown to the opposite side of a cage and one of the cage posts gave crack! Oh, this explains dents on a new cage!... Sharks hit the cage few more times rather unintentionally when they tried to catch a tuna chunk too close to the cage. One of sharks turned close to us that the strong wave her tail created just washed us all of our feet!
As the captain promised we stayed in water about 45minuts. No, we did not get cold at all. Looking on sharked from the boat was scarier – they were huge! What were we thinking jumping in water with those monsters!
It is natural for a human to fear unknown. But seeing sharks so close in their environment washed off my fears and replaced it by a fascination. Yes, they are the primary ocean predator. But they are magnificent creatures and a vital part on ecosystem. The reality is that many of then, including great white shark are threatened species and their existence is threatened by the overfishing in a hunt for their fins.
This sad looking Stanmore terrace has just received a facelift. You always hear that painting can change the whole look of a house – here’s a proof. It looks charming after brickwork was painted and rusted ironwork repaired and repainted?
Tip for DIY’ers: It takes 3-6 coats to paint the brick wall, depending on a brick quality. The first coat usually almost completely gets absorbed in a brick. So you can use a paint of almost any colour (be reasonable) as long as it is an undercoat or a self-priming exterior paint. Use your left-over paint or buy mis-tinted paint from a paint shop for a fraction of a price.
A group of us from OL’ PAINTING went this weekend skiing at Perisher Blue. This was a well deserved short getaway – we were very busy last few months. We hired one larger mountain chattel, cooked diner together, and gave some lessons to those who are beginners. A great 2 days of fun, laugh, great food (thanks girls for cooking!!!) and snow!
On a way back we had a quick stopover at Snowy Mountain Trout Farm for a quick fishing and barbeque. An interesting place!
These lovely stickers from Mae’s Etsy Shop are made of fabric, not of a vinyl! They are removable and completely reusable. They can be re-applied many times over without causing any damage to the wall. They are even washable! It’s an absolute renters dream! Just take them with you when you move!
Mae’s stickers are designed and made in Australia.
We’ve been busy this month with a painting project for Google Australia offices at Pyrmont managed by CB Richard Ellis. This is the funkiest office I have seen ever! I would pay them to let me work here!
Do not believe everything they say in papers - Goggle is VERY serious about an environment! They are located in amazing high-tech 6-star rated building. They requested we use only100% environmental low VOC paint with low VOS tints. We worked with Oikos paints supplied by Designer Paints.
And guess how they found us? They Googled us up! :)))
One of the first things to see when you walk into a living room is a big, bold TV. Although many electronics are being designed with colours that fit into your home’s decor, TV’s are still and always will be, big black rectangles. We all have them. It is a standard and expected centre-point around which the family life rotates. But it does not have to be!
We were called to re-paint this Cremorne house after previous traders messed up the job. It was not that straightforward.
House was painted with Murobond Paints. As I mentioned in this article, the common problem I found with smaller brands is that tinting is not very consistent. Each drum of paint had slightly different colour (sometimes quite different!). Keeping colour consistent along the building’s long facades was a big challenge!
Simply pore a powder into any left-over water based paint or timber finish. It will turn paint into solid no-toxic waste in just 2 hours. Paint Hardener available from Dulux paint stores and hardware stores, like Bunnings or Mitre10.
As with any new and unique products the price is still quite high. It cost nearly as much to harden paint as to buy it. But we rarely throw paint away. We give left-over paint to clients for future touch ups or use it as a base for a colour matched jobs. Still, we now keep a box of the Waste Paint Hardener in every OL’PAINTING car. So it’s here when we need it.
As I mentioned in this article low VOC paints are a great product. I strongly believe that in a close future majority of paints will be low VOC. But being a relatively new section of an industry VOCs paints are not perfect. Below are the main pros and cons of low VOC paints:
PROS 1. Non toxic & non allergic With allergies and asthma being so common low VOCs provides a healthy solution. 2. Minimal smell Sniffing paint is not usually a pleasant sensation. Low VOC paint has minimal smell. 3. Safety during project Significantly quicker drying time and recoating means unit doors will be opened for much less period of time. 4. Easy touch up Water-based enamels are non-yellowing (unlike conventional enamels). Left-over paint can be used to touch ups for years. Brushes are easy to clean up with water.
CONS 1. Paint tint contains VOC This is the most upsetting part. The darker the colour – the more tint you need and the more VOC it gets. So for better benefit stay with white or off-white colours. 2. Poorer coverage You will need more coats of paint to change a colour and this may blow off the budget. If you stay with the same colour – you are safe. 3. Higher price Add about 50% extra for material coats. But from Ol’ Painting experience the extra cost per unit usually under $100. 4. Environmental 'Low-VOC' label does not necessarily mean it is environmentally preferable. We have to consider the entire manufacturing process and its' environmental impact.
When you think about painting your place, most of you will get a slightly controversial picture - a renovating thrill on one hand and worry about paint odour and level of chemical it contains on other hand.
Why is Paint Toxic? Conventional paints release petroleum based solvents, called Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) as they dry and cure. These VOCs are used as solvents in the paint and include such toxic compounds as benzene, formaldehyde, ammonia, toluene, and xylene, all of which can pose a risk to your health.
Think of a petrol station on a hot day – sometimes you can see the petrol ‘haze’ or fumes coming from the nozzle. This is the petrol volatilising, becoming a gas. Petrol is toxic, and we are usually careful not to breathe it in. Paints are also toxic, but it’s difficult not to breathe it in when it’s in the building you are living in.
How VOCs affects us? VOCs affect us in many different ways. We use aromatherapy oils to alter our mood – lavender to relax etc. Our bodies can usually tell when VOCs are good or bad for us – we recoil at the smell of methane, chlorine and car exhausts. Paint smell is not a delightful sensation either. The VOCs in paint can trigger headaches/migraines, nausea, allergy, asthma, irritation of the eyes, nose or skin, dizziness, and even convulsions or nerve damage.
Low Toxic Paint Alternatives Lower VOC paint do not ‘outgas’, they do not make the air in our homes toxic and they are low odour. Today all of the major paint brands (such as Dulux, Taubmans, Wattyl , and some smaller brands producing water-based acrylics and enamel paint with VOC levels of around 5-10%.
Strata Building and VOCs High-rise buildings and larger unit blocks often have long enclosed corridors with no natural ventilation. So the smell and air pollution of enamel paint can stay here for weeks. Low VOCs water-based enamel paints are a fantastic alternative to conventional enamel paint for all internal woodwork.
Ol’ Painting has been using low VOC paint for few years. Just recently we completed internal painting of "Paladium" - a large 279-unit strata title building at Pyrmont.
Being a relatively new section of industry VOCs paint not perfect. See this article in Pros an Cons of low VOC paints. But this sector of paints is developing and improving very quickly. I believe that in a close future most of paints will become low VOC.
OL’PAINTING just purchased our third Dulux EnviroWash unit. The first one is permanently located in our storage room for everyday use. This second unit we now can install at the larger projects, such as strata title, commercial or renovation projects.
Dulux EnviroWash allows an environmental way of washing painting brushes and rollers. It turns paint wash-out into clean water and inert solid waste. Treated water is clear water and can be recycled or released onto a gardens. Remaining paint sludge in non toxic and can be dried and disposed into a common waste.
In last couple weeks we did painting projects for Soundfirm – a sound post production recording studio at Fox Studios. What an amazing place and what a nice people! This is the place where they record sounds to feature films, television drama series and television commercials. In Fact they just finished “Australia” the movie with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.
Admit it! Most of us have a thing for colour swatches. If you never collected at least a dozen of swatches – you probably never painted your home. Having to choose a single colour from the pile of beautiful sweet little swatches is an absolute torture! But did it even appear to you that you can have them ALL?!!
This genius idea was posted by guys at the Design*Sponge blog - a feature wall made from over 1,000 free colour swatches. Happy home decorating everyone!! :-)
OL' PAINTING has just finished one of the largest Strata Title painting projects of this year Palladium - a massive apartment complex in Pyrmont, just a walk to Sydney CBD. It spreads over 1,000m², has 11 levels, 4 foyers and 279 units. Palladium was a bit more than just a project of a month - it took many long nights of planning and 5 months to complete.
OL' PAINTING painted all interior common areas – foyers, corridors, lifts, unit doors (all 279 of them!), 176 service doors, pool areas. Just think of a challenge we had – to contact every single of 279 residents and make sure they keep their unit doors open so we can paint them. Once you’ve done with this – the rest is a peace of cake! :))) We have an experience in planning and management the projects of this size, And the job run easy and on schedule. We are happy to report that during the whole length of this job we have not received a single complain from any of the residents, Palladium Management or a strata manager- Bright & Duggan.
We used low LOC water based Dulux Aquaenamel for all woodwork. As I mentioned in this article, low VOC paints are great for large internal strata jobs with poorly ventilated enclosed corridors. Conventional paints will most certainly trigger allergies and strong reaction in some residents. As we used a water based enamel in our job and this issue never came up.
Taylor’s College
Oleksandra, our manager, for took part in a 
Ol’ Painting website
Our second terrace makeover this month. This one is in Paddington.
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Admit it! Most of us have a thing for colour swatches. If you never collected at least a dozen of swatches – you probably never painted your home. Having to choose a single colour from the pile of beautiful sweet little swatches is an absolute torture! But did it even appear to you that you can have them ALL?!!
