Hi Jane, how much are you willing to spend on this project and would you like to keep the same kind of structural elements (pavers, garden beds etc) or change the whole thing?

I repaired our bathroom doors which seem to made of particleboard, the bottoms had got wet from the showers & were quite swollen. I got a very small 'stanley' knife with the break off blades, new, so it's sharp. I held my finger on the blade & carefully sliced off the swollen parts, work slowly, then painted it with Bondcrete - paint all the flaky parts with the bondcrete (it dries very hard). Let it dry completely, overnight, next day carefully sand with a med to fine sandpaper until smooth, don't rush. I would then either stain the damaged part with matching stain or paint with a varnish stain to match, finish with a clear coat if necessary. Give the whole back a coat of clear varnish - I would use oil based not water based varnish. I would also suggest you paint the interior with clear varnish - especially the back panel - 2 coats. For the small damaged parts on the top apply stain & varnish with a very small paint brush, like an artists brush.

Hi all, I'm back again! We're almost there and just trying to decide between using axon sycon cladding or weathergroove for the vertical cladding. Would really appreciate your thoughts on whether the axon would look too modern for the house? We're keen on it for durability, low maintenance. We're thinking of the narrow board, smooth and painting it a colour similar to this https://www.haymespaint.com.au/index.php/explore-colours/colorbond/view/12/4941 I've reattached the external photos.. the plan is to replace all the brown cladding and leave the brick as is. Any help would be great. I'm very much a novice! Thank you 🙂

Don't forget to put the maximum amount of insulation in the wall, as you can't do it later. The maximum amount of bulk insulation that will fit between a standard 90mm timber stud wall is R2.5 (possibly up to R2.7).