It's been a while since my last home decor inspiration post! (Refer to my past entries here and here.) Things haven't changed much since and I still love all the pictures saved for inspiration purposes after looking through them recently. Colour palette still consists of the same few colours - black, white, grey and with wood accents.

After paying a couple of interior designers a visit, we finally learn that the theme we want to have, in ID's jargon, is a mixture of Scandinavian, industrial and loft. Sounds just about right!

Basically, what we love is a clean and bright home that gives off the feeling of warmth and cosiness. Scandinavian home designs give off that vibe but some of it tend to lean towards minimalist bare which feels a little too empty and cold for us.

Disclaimer: none of the photos that I am gonna post below belongs to me. I found them on Google.

This is one such example. No clutter, very clean but it doesn't look as if anyone lives in this house. To make it more cosy, I think we'll add a carpet, some paintings/pictures on the wall and maybe a vase or two for some colours.

What I like though, are the windows and the built-in cabinets on the wall. This is an idea worth exploring since we have a pretty huge living area and the space behind the sofa is gonna be left empty. I guess we can make do with some cabinets/shelves!

Since our walls are just gonna be white, white and eh, white, I suggested to H to have a coloured wall at the entrance (black or grey or cream) but he wasn't too keen on having a distinct colour difference in the living room.

Ooohhh I love this! I've always knew that we'll have latches on the wall but this just shows how incredible it will look in life when we do have it! And the cabinets at the bottom? Perfect. No curtains for us though! And this is a little too white haha.

The Scandinavian theme seems to have this love for brick walls going and even the interior designers suggested having one as a TV feature wall but no thank you. It IS nice and it will be a fantastic spot for picture-taking but what if one day I get bored of looking at it?

Since we cannot destroy anything in our new (BTO) kitchen, we'll have to make do with overlays and I love this glossy rectangle tiles! Only qualm is that we don't intend to have top cabinets in the kitchen and we only want half the walls (the area beneath the hood) to be tiled so I'm not too sure if it's gonna look weird...

Lastly, a monochrome theme bedroom. Love the absence of a bed headboard but probably no legs for the bed frame 'cause nobody got time to clean the dust underneath the bed. We will have a latch on the wall but not directly above our heads... Probably on the opposite wall.

We intend to sell/rent our first home after 5 years so we were advised not to spend too much on renovation and built-in carpentry works. I guess it does make sense since we cannot bring everything with us when we move, the new owner might be hacking them away so it's gonna be a waste if we spend so much now.

Hopefully my next update will be on our new home already! *SUPER EXCITED*

I wish I was an interior designer

I'm back with more home decor ideas! As I search for more, I get more inspirations and suddenly, *light bulb* what I previously like is not going to work out and I like this, this, this and this now.

I have heard so much about new home owners talking about modern, minimalist, contemporary, modern contemporary, etc, and I thought they refer to the same thing. I only know obvious styles like victorian, oriental, retro, balinese and vintage haha. So all this while, I assumed the interior design style I visualize our home is modern contemporary. Only when I did a search and read up on all these terms then did I realise what I like is known as "modern classic" with neutral tones. Is it normal to be more excited about our home than the wedding??? Because I have also read up on the different types of flooring options available in the market, as well as the pros and cons of each.

H and I were searching for images of tv consoles and omg, I am so sick of seeing yet another picture of some long rectangular shelf mounted on the wall with the tv hanging/sitting above it. Examples:

Pictures credit to their owners.

I didn't think that was nice. Yet I saw picture after picture of similar design. I don't get why there must be a feature wall for the tv. Whined to H about the lack of creativity and he asked me to change my concept of beauty around tv consoles. Well, I guess I have to unless I can find a pretty (to me) shelf to house the black box. Or we will have to get one of those plain rectangle mounted shelf thingamajig. And I don't even watch television.

Anyway, we found a fantastic idea for the kitchen island! Initially, we were thinking of getting high chairs and have our meals on the island itself. I didn't completely embrace the idea because 1) I want to look at H when I'm eating, 2) it will be difficult for our parents to climb on the high chairs and for me when I'm pregnant. So we googled and found this idea!

Pictures credit to http://homedesignlover.com

Extend the tabletop to accommodate up to 6 diners! Genius! We love this idea so much because we can sit on normal, proper chairs to eat if we have the dining table a little lower! And there are lots of legroom! It was either a kitchen island or a dining table and the impractical us obviously voted for the former but I'm so happy we can have both now! You can view more kitchen island with attached table ideas at http://homedesignlover.com/kitchen-designs/kitchen-island-with-table-attached/.

There are so many interior designer firms in Singapore and honestly, H and I don't know where to start looking. I was wondering if you guys would be so kind as to send a few recommendations our way please? Thank you so much!

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Moving on to fashion... I picked out 2 pieces from Jaa'kin the other day! Now that I'm officially an OL (hahaha wth), their dresses with longer length are excellent choices for work.



But first, a mini printed trumpet skirt! I love trumpet skirts because they help me lie to everyone by making them believe my legs are long and amazing.

Next, there's the Eliana Dress!

It is a little longer than what I would usually wear for casual but it is of appropriate length for all you tall ladies and for me to wear to the office. You will definitely stand out from the office crowd with the vibrant prints!

Jaa'kin has a retail boutique located at Citylink Mall, #B1-41, where you will find hundreds of varieties of manufactured apparel, fashion accessories including necklaces, earrings, rings and sunglasses.

Follow them on Instagram @jaakin!

Home Decor Inspiration

H and I have differing views on our future home furnishing but I am slowly and surely convincing him and nurturing him on the idea of "beauty" hahaha. I am pretty confident we can come to a consensus when the time comes!

At least we have agreed on black and cream/white as the main colours of the home. We are not into those industrial, minimalist, victorian and crazy colours/prints style, just timeless, classic and neutrals that will last the years and something we will never get tired of looking. Paintings, photographs, cushions and other accessories will add the colours needed in our home :)

Some home decor ideas I fancy:

I LOVE the sofa! So far (hahaha if you get it) I haven't seen anything that's two-toned like this. I prefer a sofa that doesn't have legs so we only need to clean the floor underneath like once a year or something(or never). Haha!

Screenshot from the Coco Chanel movie

If you love black and white, Coco's house in the movie is a good place to get inspirations. I love the idea of black borders on the doors and black linings in between the closet. I like the oval mirror too! Can consider hanging it in the bathroom but I would like a long wide mirror in the bathroom.

From FrancFranc

Pretty wall ornaments that will fit the theme. 

Yes, we are planning to have a kitchen island to replace the conventional idea of a dining table! *throws confetti* I love the idea of preparing food on a big area of space and we can have our meals on the other side of the island. I love the chic looking sunscreen blinds and the black countertop with white/cream base! But I wouldn't install top cabinets. I don't think we have THAT many things to store and I love my kitchen looking bare.

Looks good on white floor too, you think? And always remember to get chairs with backs, stools aren't comfortable.

Drop down/hanging lights are a good idea, just not in this design.

The perfect kitchen layout in my opinion! Love the cabinets, the design and the knobs on the cabinets, the shelves displaying the spices and the floor! So cosy!

I guess this is pretty standard, something I would approve of, dark and white with a pop of colours.

BUT I also approve of the following 2 layouts!

Wallpaper in the bathroom, what say you? I don't know, but this is so parisian style! I probably wouldn't place new toilet rolls and magazines beside the sink though - I wet the entire toilet on my morning routine haha!

Excellent storage idea.

Do you think these windows are possible for a HDB? I cannot even write in words how much I love black. And these are Just. Too. Pretty. Classy and sophisticated.

That's all I have for today! I'm so thrilled that we are 1.5 months away from 2014! Too many exciting things happening, more opportunities and I'm hopeful about new beginnings!

Oh yes, I have started blogging on Dayre as well and in my first entry, I revealed a tiny secret. Find me @tippytapp (http://dayre.me/tippytapp) there! ;)

Andddd lastly, H and I are traveling to Phuket and Ho Chi Minh next month, any suggestions on yummy food and things to do would be greatly appreciated! THANK YOU!! :D