picture frame all around? Fashion is only dated if you can remember when it was new so, for me diagonal looks very 70's but, enough time passes and a look becomes vintage or classic so it's really a matter of personal taste. The difference will be that the new decking products look so much better, laste longer and are easier to maintain. From the little i can see of your house a more formal style would be my choice and decking laid at right angles to the house allows for the easier extending with more decking? if/when you replace the old bricks on this side of the pillar

Thanks for posting this dilemma - I am facing the same predicament! I have been stalking pendant lights over kitchen islands for about 18 months now and have noticed that there are a lot of interior designers, in new builds and online etc. who are using two pendant lights instead of the very common ''rule of three''. This is more so the case when the lights are quite distinctive or a feature. You don't want to close in the space or obstruct the line of sight... yet you do want to opt for functionality and balance. I have just sold (argggg!) my three medium solid black pendants and have opted for a ''lighter'' feeling material that are larger, to ensure they balance. sit above a 2.8m lenght bench. What did you decide to go with.

As an architect, I have previously been taught that creating a sustainable home is about designing it so that living in it lowers energy and water use. This is achieved through designing for orientation, using thermal mass and specifying fixtures and finishes that are low impact, reuse water on site, etc. However, the latest research is showing that this is not enough to impact the rate of climate change. And that what we build from needs to be considered in order to make a dent. This is because the timeframe required to see the benefits of sustainable living in a home, is a longer play than the upfront construction from low tox, low energy, minimal footprint materials and methodologies. It has to be a two-pronged approach. Choose materials and products, and constructing efficiently with low energy and low waste. Having carbon neutral homes. And designing homes that over the long term, are low in energy and water consumption, and support the health and well-being of the occupants. A project was established in mid 2017, called “The Building Code Energy Performance Trajectory Project”. It involved the Sustainable Built Environment Council and ClimateWorks Australia, and is described as an industry-led initiative seeking improvements to energy requirements in the National Construction Code. The report was released recently, and what was amazing in this report was to read that 58% of Australia’s buildings in 2050, will be built after 2019 … which means that there’s huge potential to impact their performance and the environment through better energy requirements. And these energy requirements have not been rigorously updated since 2010, despite electricity prices having doubled over that time. Detached housing will comprise 64% of the new construction between 2019 and 2050. So every homeowner has the opportunity to seriously change the landscape of energy use and efficiency in our country. There’s some sectors of the industry really pushing back against this … largely because they believe it will dramatically dent their profit margins to have to build houses with higher star ratings. Australian homes, on average, perform very poorly, and our expectations are super low. Steve Baczek, an American architect, said something about American houses that I think sums it up for Australia as well ... “It’s not that High-Performance Houses cost too much; it’s that our idea of a fairly priced home is based on a history of building houses to meet embarrassingly low performance benchmarks. Clients don’t realise the difference between built to code vs built to last”.

Melamine describes the surface finish, not the core of the board. Most 3mm thick boards at Bunnings are MDF (medium-density fibreboard) which is not water-resistant. When MDF gets wet it swells and falls apart so is not stable for places that may get wet, which is why there shouldn't be MDF skirting boards in bathrooms, especially near a shower recess. However, if your 3mm thick panel is not MDF based its success (or failure) will depend on what material it is actually made from. Your problem will be sealing any joints, like where it meets the benchtop and vertical corners. In addition, you may also have penetrations for powerpoints and taps which will also have to be properly sealed. Near a stove, you may have steam that gets behind and starts problems. Quite often a cheap, fast fix can turn out to be a more expensive solution in the long term when it needs to be replaced. Best of luck, Dr Retro of Dr Retro House Calls/Dr Retro Virtual Visits