Our build with Express Two Storey (Ventura) in South West WA

Hello,

Been a bit of a lurker during the design stage of our build and found a lot of interesting ideas and information on here so I thought I'd share our build!

We've been in the process for about 9 months or so, prestart was back in September and once shire approval is sorted we should be building by the end of January!

We had a few plans that we looked at but ultimately settled on this one:



We made quite a few changes to it and ended up with this:






We extended the top floor forward by about half a meter because it looked a bit small for a king bed.

The kitchen changed completely and we ended up going over the sink positioning again in November as it looked quite crammed and now its like this:

These are our selections for the bathrooms/laundry.

Wall tile/splashback: Manhattan Olive Gloss
Floor/skirt/hob Tile: Australian Sandstone Light Grey
Cabinets: Formica Ash Woodline
Benchtops: Essastone Calcite
Wall paint: Taubmans Silver Spoon {Husky is shown}

This has all come out pretty badly in the photo haha, the floor tile is definitely not so light coloured (curse fluorescent shop lighting!)

For our flooring we decided not to get tiling to the main living area as per the package we had with Ventura. Instead we went with vinyl plank which saved us some money and will be a bit less cold in the winter:

For the kitchen and main living area we went with Oz Plank Southern Oak Grey:



For the carpet we chose two different types as my partner wanted to have a higher quality carpet and underlay in the high traffic areas. We also wanted to steer away from a "loop" carpet, for the staircase especially as we have cats and, while they aren't too bad on the loop carpet in the house we are currently in, I can just see them looking at the staircase as one giant scratching pole! We were also told the upgraded carpet and underlay would resist indentations from furniture which is a plus.

So for the theatre, staircase and upper floor we went with Silk Cloud on a Steplux underlay in Peru Stipple:



In the minor bedrooms we stuck with the standard carpet range; Challenger Dark Mood on standard underlay:

Siteworks finally started yesterday!

Post some pictures- good luck with the slab

Thanks! There was a tap installed yesterday, fingers crossed for a slab soon!

Here is the progress, we have a tap! Cant wait for the slab to go down

It’s exciting when it starts. If it’s anything like ours has been so far, once they start they really get stuck into it.

Good Luck.

Thanks! So good to see stuff happening, the "before" process is so long and the amount of waiting for approvals ect makes everything so slow, Im just glad thats finally behind us 😅

A lot was done yesterday in preparation for the slab

Here is an artists* render of our facade (*me on ms paint)




We went with:

White window frames

Colorbond Basalt for the roof/fascia/garage door

Brikmakers Classic Red 1c for a face brick feature on the front (that was something we wanted to add in) and for the pillar.

Bgc Duragroove cladding in Taubmans Tabby

Render and front door in Taubmans Silver Spoon

We have a slab! Now we can stop visiting site for a bit 😂





Good to get an idea of the size of the backyard now

Bricklayers started yesterday and, despite rain today, we have a wall!

Looks good. Can't beat a red brick.

Exciting! Looks great

So our external brickwork is done, hard to get a photo of the front as the site shed, toilet and temp fence are in the way but this is the front with our little bit of single course feature brick:



And this is the rear:



Everything seems quite small at this stage of course but Im really happy with the width of it. It looks bigger than I thought it would widthways haha

They was quick, it looks great!
Just curious about the lack of door to the master bedroom? Are you going to add one after handover, or does it not bother you?

Thanks!

Not too sure on the bedroom door thing, I have thought about it and it could potentially be a bother in the future. The study only has a half wall to the staircase so the top floor is essentially all open... 🤔 it will probably be something we'll have to assess when we have lived with it for a while to see if it affects us

Rooms are starting to take shape, no frames bricked in just yet but its cool to walk around and see where everything goes 😊

Good luck with the build. You certainly learn heaps (and spend way more) than yo u ever thought you would about what goes into a house..