Moving Home 3: Choosing Interior Designer and Theme

In last 2 parts of our big and back-breaking Home Move, I shared about Why we took our own sweet time before moving home and then how we used Home Move as an opportunity to reduce, reuse and recycle. After choosing the home and completing all the procedures to acquire the keys, the next very very important step is to decide on the renovation. Renovation can be a costly affair and you need a good designer to bring your dream of a dream home to reality.

Read on to find out how we zeroed on V-Creative ID as our Interior Designer and later what theme we decided to choose for our home.

Choosing the Interior Designer AKA ID is like finding a needle in a haystack

If your home is already in a perfect move-in condition then you can delay the decision of renovation but otherwise, you will need to renovate and means you will need an ID. Also, do note that there is a difference between a Contractor and an Interior Designer.

There are way too many designer firms in Singapore and it’s a mind-boggling task to zero down on ONE GOOD ONE! Our condo unit definitely needed a face-lift! Thankfully we found V-Creative ID and their Ken with his team did a commendable job!

Am sure we must have given them quite a tough time and are still giving because there’s still some work going on but when it comes to your home, no compromise right?

Lemme share with you what we as home owners learnt during this Home Renovation journey:

• Compare, compare, compare – There are so many of the IDs and you have to compare among the short-listed ones.
• Shortlisting itself is NOT EASY. So what we did was ask for free quotes on platforms like Renopedia. You can also get some references from friends and colleagues. I must say peeps at Renopedia helped me a lot. A simple registration on their site and you will be flooded with quotes.
• After you start receiving the quotes,
  • Check their website and socials
  • Check the testimonials
  • Call them if their portfolio seems to be suitable for your requirement
  • Meet them if you feel the “connection” after first 3 steps
• We shortlisted around 3-4 IDs. If you have bandwidth, timeline and energy you can actually shortlist a few more. But in my opinion, too many means too much confusion.
• During the meeting, show them your floor plan and ask them roughly their ideas. The ones who are secure and confident will immediately come up with fabulous suggestions.
• Take them for the site visit and get detailed quote.

Compare quotes, compare their interaction with you and Ta da, you have your ID. Do remember Higher quote doesn’t mean Supreme quality. Affordable but Hi-quality is what we were looking for and we got it. It’s literally like a dating, courtship and wedding I tell you ?

After you zero on the Interior Designer, then comes in picture the actual design theme that you would like to have for your home. This process is quite baffling too. I remember that for quite a few days, I used to get dreams of ONLY home decor.

Theme for the home – Scandinavian, Industrial, Vintage or Something else?

Beautiful imperfection is what we love as a Family. After we zeroed down on our Interior Designer, next step was to decide – How do you want your new home to look like?

I have seen many of my friends opting for a out and out Scandi or Industrial or Vintage etc themes. Here, I beg to differ because it’s our home and though my hubby and me wanted to follow a theme, we DID NOT want it to look exactly like THE TEMPLATE or SAME SAME like earlier homes our ID has done.

Wanna know what we did?

⭕ Google and Pinterest proved to be our greatest inspiration. Browse and browse and get some cool ideas.
⭕ ID suggested his own ideas and validated ours
⭕ Now most important step – AMALGAMATION of Google ideas, ID ideas and your own visualization of how you home should look like. Believe me, this is going to such a grueling task. Confusion, disagreements and indecisive state of mind is very common.
⭕ We used to literally close eyes and used to visualize how this room should look, how that corner should look and so on. Hubby was clear as to what he wants but I was a ball of mess. .
⭕ ID has to be WILLING to accommodate and to incorporate your ideas in the design and implementation. I give 100% credit to Ken of V-Creative ID because this young man was always cool and never said no. We added in quite a few elements to the design to suit our taste. Ken refined those ideas and made them possible. Thanks!

So finally if I really have to name the theme of our theme – I would say it’s Scandi with a touch of Vintage with a touch of Industrial – actually an amazing potpourri of everything and still the work-in-progress. Home has to evolve always.

Do share some fabulous ideas of your own home decor and I would love to share them with my readers too. Home Sweet Home to all of you!

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