Home Renovation and Savings: Real Example in London

Alex Stedman — a popular fashion and lifestyle blogger — together with her husband bought this London house in 2016. The new owners did not hesitate to move into the property in winter, without hot water and functioning heating. It took about two years to get everything in order and make the space cozy and stylish.

The house was in catastrophic condition: damp, with mold on the walls and old hanging wires. The bathroom was especially sad, with peeling tiles and a kitchen straight out of horror movies, which Alex and her husband nicknamed the "gloomy dungeon".

There was no money for a full renovation, so the couple worked on each room one by one. They started with the bathroom: they found tiles with a trendy pattern and painted part of the walls. "Many ideas I found on Pinterest," Alex recalls. "For example, using a gold edging of brass for tile decoration, I wouldn't have thought of it myself."

To save on hallway finishing, they painted it in a clean white color using the cheapest paint. Then they spent money on one bottle of Farrow & Ball almost black shade paint. It was enough to paint the door and frame, moldings, and part of the walls. This made the interior look more complex and expensive.

In almost all rooms, the walls were painted white. But the "gloomy dungeon" was transformed into a home office with stylish blue walls. The floor was laid with oak parquet, and the table was custom-made from natural wood. Making a separate countertop and buying legs turned out to be cheaper than finding a ready-made model.

Another issue to solve was the presence of a boiler in the office. "We decided to hide it in a cabinet, and the first contractor quoted around five thousand pounds for it," the blogger recounts. "But in the end, our builder made it from MDF, painted it with Farrow & Ball paint, and I picked out nice handles. It cost five times less in total."

For furniture, the owners based their choices on the selection of popular stores: H&M Home, Habitat, and IKEA. To decorate the walls, they decided on posters and paintings: Alex framed the simplest illustrations — from trendy posters to a map of Los Angeles bought for just one dollar.