every floor with different flooring - and where flooring is needed

Flooring, another subject to talk about. We have some areas finished, not sure how many % of the house (Angelo?, I guess less than 50%). To get an overview, I invite you to follow me through the house from the attic to the basement, since this is the chronological order of the renovation. Everything that needs decision is in red:

Attic:

attic living and kitchen area: white large oak wood panels 

the new stairways of the attic (new layout!): travertine steps

Primo Piano:

Remember the layout inquiry? We have decided to lay the large wooden panels (natural oak) in the above way (changing directions in the corridor between the two bedrooms)

natural oak panels for the corridor and two bedrooms in the second floor

restored and polished old original tiles in our master bedroom

restored old original tiles in the soggiorno

the stairways going down towards the piano terra (ground or first floor)

we use same material as before: travertine

Piano Terra:

small entrance, floor is prepared, but tiles are not chosen yet

creative idea for the flooring of the entrance by Angelo:

using up some old original tiles, leftovers from the now master bath and son's room

DRAFT: it is supposed to look a bit like a "carpet"

Unfortunately we only have a few of the first geometric pattern and would fill the behind area with the floral pattern. We might need a border of terra cotta tiles or wooden panels framing this "carpet".

small entrance from above -  new pattern by Angelo forming big white and red crosses

 

same old tiles used in different room differently

Sorry for the bad picture (above), it's the only I have from the former room where these tiles were used before. Here they are tiled in a different pattern. However, we were told that it is not the right way, it should tiled like in the previous picture in the entrance, a pattern that shows large crosses. Not sure who is right or if there are any rules at all. I prefer the above flooring, although I only see that it is a more calm and small pattern. - Any suggestion, experience from my readers ??

For a better understanding of the piano terra see the floor plan below. We have the small entrance in the middle and an "entrance room" on the left that leads to the living area.

old floor plan of ground floor (kitchen is bigger and bath has been moved)

I think to decide on the flooring, we need to think about our "routing" through the house.

We will not only pass this entrance when coming or leaving home through the main door. We will need to pass this entrance when coming down from the upper sleeping area to the living and dining area and kitchen on the ground floor - and back again. So, my thinking was, that the flooring of the entrance should "connect" the different areas. It is not a common entrance that leads to different apartments. It is a small entrance that belongs to an entire unit. That's why I am hesitating about Angelo's  idea of using the old tiles here. How about using terra cotta tiles on these few square meters and the same in the next room, that is our so called "entrance room", the room that leads to the living room ? In other words: Should above purple area gets same flooring? If yes, what to do with the old beautiful left over tiles? - Or two separate flooring?

The living and dining area will get a wooden floor. We just love the warmer touch of wood. The floor screed (Estrich) is ready:

view from living room over dining area to kitchen at the end

The next open point is: do we continue the parquet into the kitchen? If not, where do we stop? Or is a border of tiles around the working area enough?

Corridor between kitchen and bathroom: we have different possibilities: wood like in dining area, tiles like in the entrance (or tiles like maybe in the kitchen).

Semiinterrato:

stairways towards the guest apartment

This is an almost five year old picture, the stairs look still the same, but the walls are already done. The stairs might get the same travertine steps like all the other stairs. Not sure, if Angelo already ordered material here.

in the basement walls are done, but not the floors

the guest appartment with garden access and sea view - it will look so much better soon!

For the guest apartment in the semiinterrato, souterrain or basement, we plan a wooden parquet of large natural oak panels (from the same source like our neighbour?). Although we have to fight humidity, we thought that there are enough stones already on the wall that tiles are not an option. Also, terra cotta tiles would have the same problem with the humidity from below. Anyway, Angelo has a special construction in mind, a ventilation system, that he can better explain than me. When we come to this floor, I will post drawings and photos with more details. 

In this post I skipped the five bathroom floors, they are all tiled differently, but I wrote about this before. In case you would like to see more, follow the labels: bathroom, flooring, tiles and Before & After.

Please send me your suggestion, solution, experience, inspiration via comment below or via email to writing.suzie AT yahoo.com THANK YOU !

The tiny overhanging bath or former outhouse needs the perfect sink

Can anyone tell me how they called these overhanging shithouses people used to have in the medieval times in European cities ? (and elsewhere ?) I do not even know the Italian expression for these tiny outhouse loos.

Anyway, we have one! And it is going to be our son's bathroom.

In my previous post I gave a sneak peek into the ongoing renovation. It is another green bathroom. We have ordered all appliances, except the sink. Advise is welcome!

But look and read from the start:

front facade of the house with the overhanging former outhouse on the right

 

a closer look at a BEFORE photo (we came a long way!)

above drawing by the architect shows the former privy on the right

the layout says the WC is 1,90 m x 1,40 m

above and below is the BEFORE bath,

there were a WC (left corner), a bidet and a sink

we took out everything (please note the "big" window)

with the help of an AFTER pic (note the former big and now shrinked window!)

I made some tiles planning

And finally, see and enjoy what Angelo made out of my amateurish drawings :

Shower tray, shower faucets and tiles are installed. Walls are painted. But what about the rest?

You may have noticed that the before bathroom had no shower, but a bidet. Now, we have decided that a shower is more important than a bidet. But we have another solution for "butt hygiene". We opted for one of the smallest WC, the Starck 3 compact model (360 cm x 474 cm), and will have a hose on the side of the toilet (like you often can find in Asia). This is simple, clean and space saving!

After all this, we still have not decided on a sink !

I have some tiny space saving sinks in mind and Angelo wants the largest sink possible.

Okay, I used to have a tiny Happy D sink (see pic below, no. 1) in my guest toilet in Germany where you almost only could have washed one hand after the other.

But the above Happy D (no 2) could do. It is 345 cm deep and 460 cm long - and it has soft round corners - ideal for a tiny kid's bathroom. But of course I can't decide just like this, quickly. There are other options by Duravit (and other manufactures for sure, that I have not checked), especially I thought of using the sink from the same series as the WC since we are in such a small room, it might be best to stick to the same design:

This sink comes in many sizes, but ours could be 450 cm wide x 320 cm deep (2 cm less wide and 2,5 cm less deep than the Happy D) or 550 cm wide x 370 deep, a compact version.

My sister has in her kid's bath room the above Starck 3 sink with metal console (480 cm x465 cm). Now, she lives far away from me and I cannot check if I would like it for our son. Not sure, the almost square sink and the metal console seems a funny match. But maybe a funny match is ideal for a funny bathroom?

I would rather prefer the little pricier sink Vero. This metal console allows to hang towels on both sides. The smallest size however is 500 cm x 470 cm.

once more the site : which sink matches best ???

Since we use no longer the service of an architect or interior designer, just Angelo and me are thinking of sinks. Actually, it is only me. Angelo would buy a big sink. So, it was me who asked for detailed measurements and Angelo came up with a rough excel sheet. He added the shower tray, which is 80 cm x 80 cm. And a WC (not delivered yet), that I corrected to the given size. Then I added different sizes of different sinks. It all seems quiet tide to me. Since Angelo hates tiny dwarf or smurf sinks, we agreed on the following: we wait until the toilet is delivered and he is mounting it. Then he would do some test sitting on the toilet and check possible sink shapes. From this test he would send pictures to me which would help me to make a good decision.

If anyone of you has a recommendation, has a similar bathroom situation and knows a solution, knows the perfect sink, please email me at "writing (dot) suzie (at) yahoo (dot) com" or leave a comment below.
Mille Grazie !

Bathroom: Can't take my eyes of subway tiles

A beautiful mix of three different shapes of white tiles, separated by a thin border of black tiles and finished with a pastell mint wall paint - I am impressed by this composition ! 

Not sure via which blog I found the above picture, but the photo below is from another blog and it shows the the same bathroom! So, I proudly present both pics together in one blog :

I just can't take my eyes of subway tiles

Subway tiles (on walls) are often combines with hexagon tiles on the floor. Here above with tiny, mosaic type hexa tiles.

But you can do it easier and cheaper, but not less interesting with square tiles :

Just another bathroom of ours ...

Rectangular subway tiles on the walls and square tiles, diagonally layed on the floor

Since we had not made any further specifications than "green" wall colour, our son (7 y.) actual favorite colour, Angelo used the leftover paint from downstairs and added a border of his choice. I think it looks super good, especially when you see the "matching" green leaves through the bathroom window and ....

.... a bit of sea view

More about this bathroom later with before & after pics.

More Green in the Green Bath

Remember the green bathroom with the beautiful ceiling? Now the walls and floor are finished too and worth to post about. We have chosen a green mosaic for the "wet" areas - sink, shower, toilet and bidet - the latter not yet installed.

Actually, CC had chosen the mosaic after one of my Internet finds. And Angelo has chosen a matching colour and stucco border. And it was CC's idea to repeat a bit of green mosaic in the terracotta flooring.

Initially, I wanted two single sinks as I did not wanted to queue for hand washing when coming home from the beach. Also I thought of using one as a utility sink to rinse swim wear. However, at the end, to safe space and reduce interruptions, we agreed on one long sink with two faucets. I just learned that this solution was probably more expensive then two sinks.

I like our idea to have a stucco border to finish the mosaic area and to paint the other wall parts below the stucco border in a darker green. Similar like in the original green room.

Above you see on the left that the shower is installed - and a bit of the restored ceiling.

In this green painted corner (above) we will install a washing machine. I know..., but it has to be somewhere in the house. (If it does not look nice, I will have built a wooden frame.)

Above picture (without flash) shows again the nice floor - and walls ! 

Above: floor in the making

Below: floor finished (terra cotta con mosaico)

Here some BEFORE pictures:

Above: Splitting the "green room" to gain a bathroom. One old niche, on the left, where the sink of the old bathroom used to be (however in reverse direction) remained and now is hosting the shower in the new bathroom.

I wanted to keep that "green room subject": a two colour wall with stucco border.

Below: my "inspiration sheet" for the bathroom - we pretty much kept the theme.

But at the end, the ceiling turned out much better than planned, thanks to Angelo's artistic talent:

Above: ceiling BEFORE restoration

Above: ceiling AFTER restoration