Hi Jaimia, I tend to agree with 12sally12 sentiments. Celebrate the house and it's foibles (boxiness, entry, colour, balcony treatment). However it's great to adapt a home to make it yours - just making the right decisions is the hard part! The extent of change depends on your budget and your tolerance for inconvenience. I've listed a few ideas that vary from 'nice to have' to significant structural (and cost) changes. These will affect the colour scheme, and therefore the way it will appear overall. Roof – dark colours appear heavier and more dominant. Your home looks to be built in the 70's, it's likely due for a new roof soon. Consider a fresh new zinc or white colorbond roof. Upgrade the gutters and downpipes at the same time. Balcony – remove the clutter (replace handrails), and extend the balcony beyond the face of the main facade. This will give the effect of elongating the front elevation of your home. The detail of the new handrail extending along the continuous balcony frontage should in turn provide a fresh new look (more contemporary). Arches – these could remain, or go (depending on your desire to keep the quirkiness). These are likely to be aesthetic brickwork only - but check with a structural engineer if these can be removed. Entrance – there are two parts to this: The first aspect is to do with the appliance from the street frontage. Prioritise making the front door the most welcoming part of your home. This can be done with a pathway from the front of the site, with garden areas and great planting to accentuate the entrance to your home. The other aspect of the entrance is how entrance 'reads' from the outside of your home. This depends a little on your location (and climate). As a guide I'd suggest revising the entry wall, including the door and windows proportions to 'open up' this part of the facade to the street. This should be designed in the context of those iras listed above, as well as benign conscious of security and protection from sun loading. I hope this helps Jaimia, (Keep in mind many of the aspects listed above will require structural design asa minimum!) Cathi

Hi Sarah, hope you enjoyed your travels last night, that's something we have spent our lives doing plus living in different countries. Do look into the attic room/s they are lovely and the Velux skylights very unobtrusive, look great and if positioned correctly take care of venting any hot air, as I mentioned ours were pivoting ones and could be locked open in several positions. I much prefer these to dormer windows, you don't really notice them. The stairs were built off site and lifted into position and installed, built in. At the time we did ours a very good friend a builder did the same but just completely opened the whole ceiling space right out towards the gutters into a large bedroom play study area for his daughters, also using Velux windows. Glass ceilings, like Velux windows have been around for years, believe me I know, we're both getting older. Velux windows can be used as glass ceilings in opening and non opening configurations. I would love to see you keep the outdoor loo as well and updating the old shed into a new connecting space to the house, perhaps a glass breezeway. I will have another look at your plan again over the weekend. I love your front iron gate as well, auto sliding driveway gates work really well and would really fit with your carport. My brother in law put in a tall timber sliding gate at his last home, lovely cheers

There's a lot to take in . It is pretty quirky , but it has potential to be interesting . I'd leave the brickwork as it is , and the windows are windows -- you say they need replacing soon -- they seem okay to me . I'd quite like darker brown timber windows , but I don't know of many people that have 'reverted' back to timber -- I assume it can be done ? The back door is easy -- its screaming out for a deck in a darker wood ( or darker stained ) , but even then you could have fun , with seating built around part of it , or even a barbeque or similar built unit on the edge -- in a similar light brick , or stone . Personally , I wouldn't do a pergoda or similar over it , mainly because of the studio -- it takes away too much sun and too much open space . Likewise , a modern terrace with glass sides would look out of place . The entry door IMO is not too bad -- it works . The concrete steps let it down -- black or charcoal outdoor tiles would lift it , and look good . A stainless handrail would be the go too -- it'll look out of place until its 6 months old and starts to look 'aged' . The addition to the right needs darker mortar to make it look integrated . The roof looks okay and period in that green , so depending on how much can be reused , maybe stay with that . Or go charcoal , or even orange would suit . The shipboards in crisp white . That leaves just one thing needed -- some colour ! An orange roof with bright orange gutters would lift the whole place ; green with an almost fluro crisp green gutter colour likewise ; charcoal roof with bright red gutters ! Just enough to lift the look , even for people who don't like much colour ! I'd also do the main body of the gables in the same colour as you chose for the gutters , or maybe 1 or 2 shades down .

I seem to have similar tastes to you , but funnily enough , as I was reading down your post , but before I got to the bottom , I actually thought instead of the Big White , I would have done those areas in surfmist or similar , as I think the contrast is too harsh . And then I see you are considering it for garage etc -- I'm just a bit worried it will all start looking too wishy washy if you have the navy/white and just a small amount of neutral Surfmist ? Personally then , I would do a wooden garage door ( a strong coloured Cedar or similar ) and I'd even be tempted to redo the Big White 'panel' on the front , in the same cedar ( vertical timber ) , and paint your front door in the orange you talked about -- that existing dark colour does absolutely nothing for that door . Where you have the orange temporary downpipes I'd try and incorporate some wooden poles along that side -- it would look quite good if you matched the downpipes ( maybe hiding the downpipes behind 150 x 150 cedar 'poles' or similar ? ) . Basically , its the small details that will really make your look here .