Sweet Home Vol. 31

The issue of Sweet Home Magazine featuring our home is available now!

As I mentioned previously, they came to the house to shoot our home and interview R and I about living in Malaysia.

They shot some of the antiques we had out which are mainly Persian items. It's fun to see these items in a magazine!

Pick up a copy if you can. It's in Mandarin, if you can read it. Otherwise, the rest of the magazine is great just to look at the pictures as it features a number of contemporary homes in Malaysia/Southeast Asia.

The Case of the Curious Coconut

I was out at the back of the house and found the strangest thing. There is a coconut (I think that is what it is) sitting on the water drain grill.

What is weird is that there are no palm trees or trees with this kind of nut anywhere around the area. No trees up on my neighbor's property where it might just fall down on to mine. And what else is strange is the odd location it has been neatly placed. R and I figure someone or something (an animal?) must have brought the coconut here.

Pseudo-Greenhouse

Truth be told, I always wanted a greenhouse. One of those fancy greenhouses that they have in the UK... where they are separate buildings or attached to the house. Well, I now kind of realized that dream with my makeshift greenhouse.

The idea came to me when I was out in the Wet Kitchen (more info about Malaysian wet kitchens in an older post here.) pictured above. This wet kitchen serves mainly for washing big pans and other cleaning activities. Although the Malaysians use it to cook in. See in the photo above the yellow gas tank under the counter. It is the gas tank that connects to my stove in my kitchen. But, the wet kitchens usually have a countertop hob burner placed on the lower counter in the photo above (where the water bottle is sitting). Anyway, one day I was potting some seeds out on that countertop and looked over to the empty covered patio to the right of the wet kitchen.

When we first moved in I thought we would put some furniture back here and would sit back here. But that didn't really materialize one because the space is just behind the bathroom on the first floor and two because there are upper floor bathroom pipes running above it to the second floor master bedroom bathroom. Third because the neighbor's house in the back backs ours so there is no real view except the wall. So it just isn't the kind of place I want to lounge around, I'd rather go to the front patio.

So I had this idea while potting plants that the space could be a pseudo-greenhouse because the roof on that part is clear not tile. I thought it would be a good place to grow seeds and cuttings for the garden. I made some concrete and glass platforms with glass that was in the house when we moved in and now I have my own greenhouse! It is hot and humid enough here that having a fully enclosed greenhouse in Malaysia, I'm not even sure if that would work it might be too hot. So this clear cover roof with open sides, I think allows for air circulation. It's been working pretty well so far, the space gets good sun but not too much.

I have planted some seeds and some are starting to sprout. I've also taken some cuttings and have them in water bottles some have started to root as well. My thought on that is everything here in Malaysia grows so fast, so some of these plants should root. The greenhouse is more of an experiment to see what I can grow from seed and cuttings. For example, I took some cuttings from the hedge around the front of the house as I'd like to fill it in with some more plants. But I don't think those are going to root. If not, oh well. I've also taken cuttings from the passion fruit vine and some other orange plant vine which grows on my neighbors property. I've got Thai basil attempting to root as well as some Christmas palm seeds, the bunga kantan experiments, chili peppers and peacock tree seeds. There's more I'm forgetting too. I'd like to have an herb garden around this space with herbs I can't get in the stores easily here like tomatillo which I have never seen. Also grow herbs we use a lot of like Thai basil. But it will all be very slow to start.

The clear plastic??? roof

Malaysian Patio Furniture

It is an underestimate to say I am dying (me not R) for some Patio Furniture for the house. Even our cat T would love at least something to lounge on out on the patio. But you can see by the photo that the patio remains furniture-less. Since we made an offer on the house I have been looking for the perfect patio set. But there are a couple issues here... Firstly, the patio furniture in Malaysia is expensive... and I’m not sure why when everyone has patios to fill. Secondly, my idea initially was to do some very cushiony comfortable sofa and chairs to lounge in; but the overhang on the roof doesn't go out that far so in bad weather, the rain comes crashing into the space at times all the way over to the sliding glass doors. Therefore, buying cushion furniture that is not at least trying to be outdoor fabric (mold resistant and in a neutral color where dirt wont show up easily) I write 'trying' because brands made here or china might imply they are water resistant, but that doesn't mean they will weather Malaysian storms over time. Some of the options are the plastic type rattan patio furniture like what is offered at Houz Depot which are expensive and I don’t really care for the sets. Houz Depot is like the Home Depot of Malaysia. The company boasts that they are the largest home improvement wholesale hyperstore in Malaysia with 120,000 square feet of shopping space. But, it is no Home Depot (we did get our Rubine Microwave from Houz Depot at a great price, so they do have some things). See a few images of Houz Depot’s Patio Furniture below or check their website here (the prices I pulled from their ad catalog I picked up at the store awhile ago):

HOUZ DEPOT POSHZ Rattan Outdoor Furniture Set GCV802V-4A Regular Price 5,528 RM Sale Price: 3,888 RM

HOUZ DEPOT POSHZ PVC Rattan Outdoor Lying Bed MJ-08SL018 Regular Price 3,868 RM Sale Price: 2,699 RM

HOUZ DEPOT POSHZ PVC Rattan Outdoor Furniture c/w Cushions MJ-08S006 Regular Price 8,498 RM Sale Price: 5,988 RM

But even the cushions on these outside sets we can't be sure are mold resistant.... so I am forced to reconsider the cushion issue unless I can find cushions that I think will at least last a couple years. I have been looking at books of houses especially in Central and South America and see that they use some Rattan and it looks pretty cool. So I think to myself, maybe we can do something special in Rattan that is made locally and has a Malaysian feel that you can't find elsewhere. But the problem with this idea is that most Malaysian Rattan is pretty traditional (in a bad way) and often the furniture does use cushions which are not mold resistant. There is a Rattan place near our house where the guy makes the furniture right on site and there is a chair called a Coil Chair that I thought looked neat and I can't find online outside of Malaysia. This is not a Papasan chair (one of those big round rattan chairs with a cushion that they sell at Pier 1 in the US). This chair doesn't use a cushion.

A photo of the Coil chair, but this isn't a great photo as it makes the chair look like a satellite, from the side the chair is quite stylish

But they seem a bit small, so I asked the guy if he can make 2 bigger coil chairs and he said yes, but he wants a huge price to make them! The smaller Coil Chair I tested is very comfortable without a cushion actually, so here we wouldn't have to deal with the cushion issue. I even like the guy's swing chair and thought maybe we could rig one or two on the side of the patio between our house and the neighbors which would give us more privacy as the swings would do some blocking, but rattan swing chairs are very trendy right now around the world and might be out of fashion before we take our first swing.

The Rattan man told me his price is high because there is a lack of Rattan material right now to make new products. I'm all for re-using and buying a used set if we can find some cool vintage (or older rattan) but I haven’t seen anything just right yet.

If I could get my hands on some of this type of furniture in the photo above which looks similar to the Danish Mid Century Retro furniture, I think these have been made in Malaysia, it would be great. But the price is bound to be high and the furniture will need cushions.

For now, I keep looking...

Birds of Paradise in Orange

Well surprise surprise... we do have orange Birds of Paradise in our front landscaping after all! I posted before that the landscapers put in red and yellow Birds of Paradise which are kind of small in size. Well, this larger orange Bird just bloomed and there is another on the other side of the landscape coming up. I love the orange and the size of these... but they are mixed with the red and yellow flowers. I tend to like repetition in landscaping, not a mish-mash. But, oh well. I guess it makes for some different flowers and after watching over time to see what we have I guess we can always change it.

House Numbers and Planters

I always see things on CONTEMPORIST. Yesterday their feature Broadway Residences by Stephen Vitalich Architects in Venice, California showed a house with the kind of house numbers I want to put on our house and some dark planters on the Venice House’s roof Garden that would be great for the landscaping... now if I could only find them in Malaysia...

Exterior House Lighting in Black

We chose black accent lighting on the exterior of the front of the house over silver as we thought the color would look better on the Cement colored walls of the house and look nice with the dark walls along the property. The lights on the first floor have two lights (up and down), while the two lights on the second floor around the big windows have only downlighting because their wasn't much room to the ceiling above.

Exterior of House

The painting of the House Exterior and Roof Tiles is finally complete! The Roof Tiles are painted with Dulux Roofshield in Idaman Grey 10524. The Exterior House walls are Nippon Cement 9507. The Timber under the roof is painted with Nippon Timbershade (Low Sheen Finish) in Silhouette Grey 4223D and the Exterior Property walls are Nippon S 8500-N (accent base).

We still have to order the exterior lights. I think we are going with black. And now it is time to move on to the landscaping!!!

at the back of the house the covered wet kitchen

Bungalow Exterior Paint and Property Walls Color

The first coat of Nippon Cement 9507 has been painted on the exterior of the house. They still have to paint one more coat, but the house is looking a bit lighter than we thought it would.

So in trying to determine the exterior property walls color, we have opted for a very dark grey, nearly black Nippon color S 8500-N (accent base). We think that the dark wall on the side and front of the property will give the house some color and character. With the bright flowers and greenery we will add to the flower pots on the exterior side wall and up on the second floor flower planter, we should get more color around the house.

S 8502-Y on the left (the lighter color) and S 8500-N on the right

Other Progress- the Roof painters are now painting the tiles on the lower roof and 'after lunch' (this is a very vague time in Malaysia since lunches can run up to two hours!) the Corian Countertop should be arriving as well a B to oversee the installation and install the Ikea Stainless Steel handles and Hava handles. If we are lucky maybe the Bareno kitchen sink and Tuscani standalone cooker can be hooked up today, tomorrow or Saturday and we will be ready to cook!

Painting the House

On Saturday the Painters power-washed the house to prepare it for painting, they say it is important to power-wash all of the old paint off the house and any peeling paint before painting. It was a HUGE mess. Water seeped into the windows inside the house, peeling paint landed on the ground and surrounding bushes and trees and it still remains. Luckily, we haven’t done the landscaping yet. After the power-washing episode, the painters painted two coats of Nippon Vinilex Wall Sealer 5100 over the ceiling of the roof underhang and walls of the entire house. The sealer is very important in Malaysia, because without the sealer they say the cement walls will peel; it is true because the sample colors R and I painted on the front of the house had already started to peel (after less than a couple weeks! And when they power-washed the sample color sections on the wall, the paint peeled off in giant chunks because we didn’t use sealer under the paint when we did our test). Yesterday the painters painted the ceiling of the roof underhang and today they have finally begun to paint the Exterior Walls with Nippon Cement 9507.

House with two coats of Nippon Sealer

Seeing the house with the peach accent color gone and white from the the sealer confirmed our decision not to paint the house exterior bright white which we thought about doing during the color selection when we about gave up on mixed colors here in Malaysia. White looks way too stark for the house, think Cement will blend into the landscape better.

Exterior Lights Removed

In anticipation that the exterior wall painters would be painting the walls of the house soon, we removed the 6 rusted lights from the front of the house. We plan to replace them with some of those black or stainless steel long cylinder type contemporary lights. We are leaning toward black, but will wait until the house is painted before deciding. We also need two lights for the exterior ceiling, one by the front door and one by the back door. Have been looking for contemporary hanging models that will look good with the cylinder lights on the walls, but can't find anything. The only hanging lights we are seeing in Malaysia are similar to the dated style of the lights we just took off or square wood/metal ones that have a 'tropical' feel (which we aren't going for). I also noticed there are some electrical wires near the wet kitchen, some at the back corner of the house coming out of the roof underhang (I think this is where many houses in the area attach long florescent lighting which we won't do) and some wires up by the side of the front door near the Bunga Kantan plant which could use some spotlights if we can find them.

One thing I keep asking myself is how can these things get so old so fast... the house is only a few years old, yet these fixtures are totally rusted. Or how the roof tiles have become damaged so quick. I guess it is the extreme weather I am not used to.

Below are the kind of lights we are thinking of buying...

Work Continues....

After 8 full days of work the Stainers finally finished. Now B can come in and install the upper Kitchen Cabinet Doors (bottom should wait until after the Corian is installed). He will also work on the shelf lighting and installing the built in Rubine Microwave.

The Roof above the second floor has been painted and now the Exterior Wall Painter will come and do the underhang, timber and exterior house walls on the second level. Once he is complete the roof painters will come back and paint the lower roof and finally the exterior wall painter will do the ground level of the house and exterior walls on the property.

Exterior Wall after fence was removed

Nippon Malaysia Exterior House Paint

So our first attempt for the exterior house color in Nippon was Noble Grey 9572.

It is the sample color in the photo above painted on the wall between the windows second from the right. And in real light looks much too Silvery-grey. So we tried again.

Choosing a more beige color (which was against what we wanted to do) we picked Nippon Cement 9507. And when put on the wall (as pictured above) it looks more grey than beige, which is closest to what we want. So we are going with it, because it looks ok with the green windows which can't be painted (arrggghh!!) and will look ok with the Grey color we are painting the roof tiles.

So we can now choose the timber color (the strip of wood that falls below the roof and above the exterior walls) and also a paint color for the border property concrete walls at the side and front of the house. By the way, the Nippon Cement 9507 can't be mixed as a 5 year color, it has to be made as a Nippon Weatherbond Advance 8 or 10 year color. The price is 115myr which is 5myr more per 5 litres for the 8 year verses ICI pre-mixed at 110myr. We can only hope that it really does last an extra 3 years!

More Bad Color From Dulux

We have been told to go with ICI Dulux Weathershield for the exterior paint on the house, which lasts 5 years. When asked why it is better than Nippon or Jotun no one can give us an answer, just that everybody in Malaysia uses Dulux Weathershield.

So to keep the price down, we decided to pick one of the pre-mixed colors from the chart on the two images below. I chose Zambezi Rocks. But when we paint a sample on the house, it looks more like a color used on a 60s Pataya restaurant. So after wasting some money and getting flustered with Dulux, we decided to try Nippon.