Energy-Efficient Homes Services in Gardenvale, Victoria

“We engaged Darrin Albert from Sketch Building Design to design our family home renovation. Darrin came highly recommended and we were certainly not disappointed. Our vision was to develop a contemporary two storey addition to our Edwardian home. The design delivered and service provided exceeded our expectations. Darrin and the team were professional, enthusiastic, responsive and focused on our needs and budget. They were a pleasure to deal with and we would happily recommend.”

“We highly recommend Emmy Design to anyone who wants modern interior design for their homes. Recently, we hired Emmy Design to help us to renovate our home. Emmy’s work consisted of choosing new wall colors, artwork, carpets, tiles, new pieces of furniture in many rooms, and much more. Emmy demonstrated an impressive level of expertise and professionalism throughout the entire renovation process. She has transformed our home from a traditional style to a model style. We are very happy with her modern design and really enjoy our new home now. We highly recommend Emmy Design to you because: 1. Emmy is an exceptional interior designer who is passionate and extremely knowledgeable about her work. 2. Emmy treated us with patience and respect. Whenever we have any questions or requirements, she always answers us with patience and try her best to meet our requirements. 3. Last but not least, Emmy treated us like her friends.”

“We are fortunate enough to live in and love our mid century home. We'd been delaying renovations and updates as we simply didn't know where to start and didn't want to make errors with design details. Alistair's 'Dr Retro House Call' has given us the confidence to get moving! Alistair has also brought to our attention things that the average person would not consider with regard to safety, which is particularly pertinent as parents of a young child. Alistair provided us a very thorough overview of what work and repairs are necessary and then what we can do to improve our home aesthetically. His breadth of knowledge and enthusiasm for mid century homes and design is very inspiring.”

“I have photographed a number of Kirsten's projects over the last few years. Not only is she a pleasure to work with, but the feel of the homes she creates is both warm and tasteful. I have always been impressed with the effective use of space, the amount of light drawn into the spaces, connection to the garden, and the beautiful, unique detailing Kirsten manages to incorporate into each project. I'm very much looking forward to working together again and can't recommend Kirsten and her work highly enough.”

“Steve provided an excellent and professional service. He has a great knowledge of design and understood our vision and needs in designing our dream homes. Steve’s collaborative approach as well as his patience made the process an easy one. Highly recommended. Thanks Steve!”

“PROJECT MARCH 2014 We have been absolutely delighted by the total experience associated with the design, implementation and in the end, the completion of our remarkable "Hill House”. A day doesn’t go by without a sense of contentment as I smile at some design feature that just makes “sense” or an aspect of how we enjoy living in this space and place – it just “works”! We were absolutely delighted with the experience of designing our house with Mihaly Slocombe. The project is true to the importance we place on environmental sustainability, aesthetics and the clever use of amenity. In the end, the integrity of the creative design is a source of enduring pleasure to us. UPDATED JULY 2016 As our family expanded to the next generation [of grandchildren], we decided to return to the Architects who designed our family home, to create a suitable extension. The brief had been to create something complimentary to the existing design, be playful, functional, environmentally efficient and still aesthetically compatible with the existing home. To our immense delight, despite the obvious challenges and complexity to meet all aspects of the brief, all our expectations were not only met – but superbly exceeded. The project was implemented with a deft efficiency and professionalism and remained on budget and true to brief. What more could we ask for? Whilst I can’t imagine a further extension being required – if it was, I know exactly where I’d go!”

“I can strongly recommend First Avenue Homes. Anthony is a high quality builder and has the ability to make very complex tasks simple and completed our complicated renovation project in a timely manner and within budget. I will be going to First Avenue Home first for any renovation or construction project in the future. Thank you Anthony.”

“Creative, attentive, efficient, hard working, totally professional and focused on great creative outcomes, these young architects have been a delight to work with. From creative schemes to detailed plans to working with councils, statutory authorities, builders and tradesmen, they couple a youthful innovative approach with a practical hands on attention to building, construction, planning , timelines and budgets which gets the job done. They are conscious of budget and value and have over- delivered at every step of the client architect relationship and Project. Young minds and old heads. We would work with them again in a heartbeat. And I would unhesitatingly recommend them to anyone.”

“We have always planned to renovate our existing house but had been unsure as how to overcome some flow and function issues. We wanted to add a bedroom/study, an alfresco entertaining space and a garage/carport onto our existing house. We had seen lots of renovations of similar houses but they always seemed to have something missing or were not quite right! The My Architect team were recommended after a chance conversation at a child's party - the initial meeting and concept plans really appealed to us, the idea of a relatively small outlay to see what the options and initial costings were. We contacted Cate at My Architect who set us up an appointment with Lyndal Williams. We had quite set ideas about what would be possible. Lyndal patiently worked through our needs/wants and has put together the perfect floorplan for us. It is quite different to what we had imagined and we have managed to tick off all the priorities as well as adding some wonderful extras that we feel will make our home function more efficiently as well as being a great entertaining space! We had initially planned to only use the My Architect team for the concept plans. However after dealing with Lyndal we felt that we simply had to continue to utilise her skills to help us complete the project. The set pricing for the My Architect services made us confident that we were clear about this cost from the beginning. So far we have completed plans for tendering and are waiting for building to commence in September. Cate has followed up and sought feedback along the way and despite our project taking quite some time we have never felt rushed! Lyndal has done a great job with our plans and really understood what we wanted before we did in some ways. She has also dealt with our questions and queries patiently!!!! We can highly recommend that anyone considering renovating or building use the My Architect team!”

“As a builder, I admire an architect who can realise the potential in an existing space, maximise the purpose and suitability for its unique owner and surrounding environment. In the past year I have worked on 2 projects with Jane, both to renovate heritage listed homes in the inner Melbourne region. I highly recommend her to individuals seeking a point of difference and peace of mind on their next project. Jane has a sound understanding of building practices and I really enjoyed building with her from concept to completion.”