Thank you to all for the wonderful feedback. I didn't intend to paint the walls blue rather a taupe/brown - the De Sousa home is a great example. Since publishing the photo and the question - I have viewed many fabrics in many shades of blue and came to the conclusion blue is probably not the right choice. The photo looks beautiful but have moved to silver/grey with plum purple walls. But keeping the padded bedhead with demi lune side tables, an occasional chair in far corner and I already have the perfect bedside crystal tired lamp bases already. Again, could go very wrong with purple but I think I've found the perfect colour here in Australia. There are some stunning fabrics available in the silver/grey tone and I think it would well in the bedroom. The starting point funnily enough in moving to silver/grey was stumbling across the most gorgeous drape fabric. Then I built the rest from there. Now it's down to making final selections. A frustrating but fun process. Can't wait to see end result. Fingers crossed it all works out! Thank you once again - this site is amazing and your feedback is most helpful.

This is the room in question the furniture will be replaced with a creamy white suite but the carpet will also go when the new furniture arrives

Choosing a pool finish has been super stressful because once its done its done! Also, it is so hard to determine what a color will look like given the amount of light, depth of the pool, and surrounding landscape. I think I have finally narrowed the selections down to Ocean Blue Pebble Sheen and Midnight Blue Pebble Tech. Does anyone have experience with either of those? Does anyone have experience with any finishes that have the Shimmering Sea sparkling sea shell blend (does it make that much of a difference)? We really could go either way with the Tec or Sheen. It mainly comes down to color. Any advice and photos would be greatly appreciated!

your new kitchen looks gorgeous...i guess the months it takes to replace would give you time to decide if you hate the gloss but what could you do with the discount they're offering and after all the disruption of planning and installing the new kitchen i would prefer to accept the goodwill from the cabinetmakers and a generous discount for something else you need and thought you couldn't afford...remember that it's only the difference in the cost of the counter for you but it's also extra labour cost and time away from other work for them and i'm sure the cabinetmakers would prefer to move on