Living Room Layout
They got going.
They wasted not too much time, just a little bit of time, to start renovating me. I can cheekily inform you that this wasted time was used by my Lady Owner mainly to try communicating in Dutch about complicated matters with the contractors that she found through this very useful site Werkspot.nl , which is like a dating site sort of thing, but for builders and whoever needs their service. She, of course, soon gave up using Dutch and just ran to her husband every time Dutch was absolutely needed, meaning, practically, her husband did all the negotiation, planning, and contracts. Meaning, he did most of the job. All the time.
First step was knocking down the wall that separated my kitchen part and the living area part. A long time ago, just like most houses built before the time of good insulation and good heating system, I was built with the kitchen opening up to the cold entryway, so that the living room could just be snug and warm and free from odors. You know, the normal stuff. A lot of people actually still have this same exact layout, but like a lot of other people, too, my current owners like an open plan living. Luckily for them, my two previous owner had done some jobs getting rid of that door leading to the entryway and creating an entrance to the kitchen from the living room. However, this entrance was tiny, and the closed kitchen was tiny. My Lady Owner really couldn’t imagine how she, her husband, their son, two cats, and the soon-to-be-huge-yet-still-nonexistent-puppy, would co-exist in that tiny space.
Teeny tiny claustrophobic kitchen.
The wall was a load-bearing wall, though, and here in The Netherlands, you should ask for the government’s permission to do this kind of construction change, even when it’s your own house. Then she had to find an architect who could convince the said government that this action wouldn’t cause me, the house, to collapse entirely to the ground. So after a somewhat long process and a lot of complaining from Lady Owner, one fateful Tuesday, some men came to knock down a massive chunk of my body—that wall.
The beam supporting my weight (not that I’m THAT heavy), and will you look at my beautiful exposed beams?
And this is after somebody, that Lady Owner found online, came to took the kitchen apart. That was one funny story, by the way. And in case you wonder, she did give the old kitchen away for free through Marktplaats.nl . She had never been bombarded by so many messages before, and all in Dutch. Psst: no more wall!
And now, it’s all nice and open. Unfortunately, by getting rid of the wall, these men also took half of the living room ceiling! Oh, to endure this pain, having humans ripping me out like that as though I were a dead thing. But I’m just a house, hey.
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List of Contractors
Architect:
Adviesburo D. de Meijer
Kalmthoutsebaan 4
4884 MH Wernhout
T: +31(0)648966451Breaking open load-bearing wall:
Steinhoff Constructions
T: +31(0)345-681114
Cost
Architectural drawing: 356.95 EUR
Breaking open load-bearing wall: 3825 EUR