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Ok.  I think I did mentioned that I entered a competition from our corporate association.  Now, after that, our house got featured in the magazine.  And now, they want more article from me.  Good advertisement for me.  

But the thing is, I do not have any professionally taken pictures for my projects (call me kedekut, but hey these people - the good ones, are really pricy)!! Good thing is they do provide photographers for free.  They arrange for photo shooting day and 2 houses were shot in a day with 2 teams.  Well, to be honest, I don't quite like the pictures taken (simply because they take care of the ID but not so much of the architectural essence of the house which I am proud of..).  See my point?  I CAN be that fussy.  But since it is for FREE and I got free advertisement, hush, I don't even bother to comment much on the pictures.

The thing is, well, I have to prepare for write ups.  Hack.  Another time consuming matter which crack my head and nerves.  Hello, being solo means I have tonnes to do but well, for free advertising of the company, I just swallowed the pain and force myself to start typing, typing and more typing...See, I am a very sincere designer, I love pictures, I love my designs and the things I do, but having to translate what I do in words are just tooo.....tooo......argh......

Anyways, then they asked me for my picture!! OH. MY. GAWD!  Where to get the picture??  I have not taken any proper pictures for ageees!  Anyways, I hate to delay on the articles and their work and today I dragged myself, pulling out my camera and tripod.  Thank goodness, good weather.  I purposely making sure that I am wearing black.  Put on my earrings and decided to put them off so that I look more natural.  Smiled and posed, nope, smiled and posed again, nope....until I got these 2 which I think can pass just ok...I had to end the session fast before my domestic helper thought that I am a jerk!! ;P

Quite a Fruitful Year

Last year, I THOUGHT I have not accomplished much in my work and also my personal life. It is like so quiet and yet forever busy kinda thing.

Then recollecting back, I saw myself moving into a new house, new environment, new neighbourhood and my boys LOVE where we are staying now. They just LOVE the new house.

Then one of the bungalows that I had designed was selected by the developer to be interviewed. And so they interviewed the happy clients and took pictures and videos of the house. Pleased.

Then without me knowing, another house of my design was published (without acknowledging me, the ID took credit of EVERYTHING...hsh, hush..) in a local magazine. I was delighted when my client showed me and gave me a copy. Delighted.

Then with friends' encouragement, I submitted our newly renovated house for a design competition organized yearly by the fellow Architects in Malaysia (PAM) and guess what?? I am shortlisted! I did not expect anything but I am shortlisted! Hey...

Not bad after all...kan? (* ps : just in case you wanna know : I did not win la! ;) ) The picture on the left showed my favourite part of my house which is not selected to be published in the medalists / shortlisted booklet....Don't know why they had selected the normal views of the house...hmmm...want to ketuk who ever choose the pictures! ;(

Frantic Start

This is a crazy month. I signed up for an examination to be a facilitator for Green Building Index last month and from then on, it is :

. No weekends
. Waking up middle of the night to study
. Waking up middle of the night to catch up with work
. fatigue
. fatigue...
and fatigue........

First, I don't really INTEND to be one. I just want to know MORE about this GBI thingy. It is an in thing in the industry. Plus, more architects and even clients already know more in depth, I can't be just sitting and relax and I don't want to be in the last batch either.

The highlight is my maid was away for 2 weeks for her 'vacation' back home during this critical period. And that blown my brain and body apart, well, almost..

Thanks to my dear dear husband who had been so helpful taking care of the kids and cleaning the house, I mainly need to cook...;)

It is all over, and now live is back to normal and my maid is back! Yippie!

Good to go NORMAL again, ahh.....being able to sleep till 8.00am is good!

;)

Thinking Mode

I am extremely busy lately. Well, as usual.

And when I am thinking, I mean having deep thoughts; when I am forcing my creative juice of my noodle, when I am twirling my pencil trying hard and quick to come out with something - I need warm air! Yes, I can't think when the air con is in full blast. Just can't.

I remembered having to escape down to the library section in my previous office to do that. Or go out to the cafe nearby, anywhere but not in the freezing dry air in the office!

So sometimes hubby will come back and ask, 'Aren't you feel stuffy and hot in here?'

I just brushed it off with a big smile. ;)

(*picture showing my cheeky son peeping through the intended gap for ventilation just so that I don't I run out of air in my office while thinking! ;P)

Praises

My main contractor said he is really 'not free' having to entertain the passerby that called him or bugged him during the construction of my house. He said there are really quite a handful (well, exaggerating on his part of course). Anyways, for most contractors, they would be so happy to entertain so that they can rope in more possible clients. But unfortunately, this contractor friend of mine just do BIG projects. He is doing it for me as a favor as a buddy. Some even told him this: "you just COPY (hello??!) the design of the house and quote for mine la." WTF??!

Now, we ourselves had our neighbours (or are they?) coming in during / after construction of the house to demand to see the interior of the house. Initially, yes, during the early construction stage. We would not mind. But hey, there are some, after us telling them we are the owner, for privacy purpose, they are NOT allowed. And still, these thick faces still say, for a quick look only. Just a quick look at the MASTER BEDROOM toilet. HELLOOOOO!! Knock knock!! Though, at that time, we had boxes and things look messy and all, as if we are not moved in. BUT helleer, we said PLEASE, no. Gently and politely too! I feel like calling the police for intruders!

Well, of course, there are some nice neighbours and sincere comments and praises. I have to say that I am very proud of the house. Every single detail is drawn and discussed with the contractor or sub-contractor. All my friends love the house, even bringing their friends to see the house! Goodness.

It is a kind of encouragement. A kind of affirmation for the work. Hard work.

I am really glad.

They encouraged me to send for some local magazines for publications. I am still doubtful. Every time I look at the house, I have to say, I really like it but is this SO SO special? And when I compare myself to some great architects, I feel so small and ..................maybe not!

Yesterday, a note from the letter box goes like this:


















I am really glad. Even if I don't get the job after meeting this guy(who knows if he cannot afford my fees?? :P), I am still very very much a happy designer!

Hey, stranger! Thank you so much!

My the other Baby- a peep inside!

Ok, since there are requests to see the inside of my 'the other' baby, here are some of my favourites:

(right, read clockwise)
1. The high ceiling of the living room with some tropical touch. I love the water feature (see the stone studded urn?) and the pond signifying and dramatizing the 'entrance' to the space. I am so happy that the owner finally sold to the idea as during the construction period, they almost scraped and covered up the pond for wanting a bigger living space...See, my boy is enjoying with his friend and all my boys love the water feature! The sound of water is just so calming and pleasing in our hot and humid weather!

2. The bright and airy master bathroom. Need no artificial lighting of any kind during day time! The clients are pleased too!

3. The master bedroom. Read the continuous big sliding door that stream in abundance of light and air?! I just LOVE it!

4. The rustic feel of powder room. Yes, no 'window' but big opening to the blue sky from atop! See the bare cement wall? We love it. :)

5. The low entrance space opens up to a brighter, well-lit stair well.

I can't be showing every bits due to some respect to the owner la...

Like it?

Renovations

I don't know how many times I had been drawing and knocking down walls for other peopl's houses. This time it is MINE, yeah, OUR VERY OWN HOUSE, from the floor to the ceiling and to the roof!

Compared to our renovations done to our tiny apartment last time, this is at least 5x the work. Everything seems to be so old and meant to be torn and thrown.

If only we had more budget! Well, nevermind. I will twist and turn and squeeze my brain to make the house looks good with an extremely tight budget.

We finally started work on 3.3.2010! Consider a good date on the lunar calender. I just pray that everything goes well.

I have to reinforce myself with these reminders ALL the time :

1. This is just another house, relax....
2. Use your brain, cheap material can look good too...
3. Breath, DEEP breathe, remember - CANNOT argue with your partner during the process.


I have to say, being a designer, my brain always, yes, always flashes with ideas and images. It is nice that you can imagine things but when the images start to twist and kept coming or when you are trying to imagine hard for alternatives, I tell ya, it KILLS so many of my brain cells!! Haha...and when you see me staring in blank, and yes, I am not listening to whatever you are talking, nothing travels into my eardrum as my brain is flipping through images. GOSH, I tell ya, it must be tough being my partner sometimes.

Honey, I guess ya know what I mean..:)

Long-break Effects

The holidays ended finally. Too fast and too short. I think.

I am slowly picking up myself to work. As usual, there are always things to draw, letters to type, phone calls to be made...and I put ALL that behind me and I am flipping through one of my favourite architectural magazines, newly arrived and hot in my hands..

I am not those springy and ever-in-the-high-spirit type of person. I need to settle and ease myself to the right mode every time.

I love the way the Chinese companies celebrate the 1st day of working though. Must dress up nicely, red if possible. Lit up the red long fire crackers to signify good luck- the thundering sound that breaks the normally quiet morning, I LOVE IT. It somehow lift up the spirit better (at least for myself). And the lion dance? I just simple LOVE it. Speaking of which, I did not see any performance- live, YET, this year. I could just hear the drums and symbols beating from afar... Anyways, this idea of celebrating the 1st day of work, it gives hope, it lifts up the spirit and it sets the mind to work harder and have a better year ahead!! I LOVE THE SPIRIT, I LOVE the positive attitude.

Maybe next year, I should do the same. YEAH!! I really think so! Great!

Oopsy! Waita-minute, does that mean that I am going to break the law?? :P

Another - the Mask

I am extremely excited as this house is going to be exciting!!

I have to say that the initial idea is NOT from me but I carried through the idea, made some changes, improved it. Most importantly scaling to the right proportion and livable and here, we have the MASK... Hopefully, it will be completed by this Christmas!
Creating is torturous but exciting at the same time.

It is DONE!

After 2+ long years on site, the house I like is finally ready. This weekend, I am going to take her pictures for CF purpose.

I. AM. SO. HAPPY.

Portrait

Yes, notice I changed my picture on my profile? Oh it was for a corporate member picture thingy and being a last minute person, I got hubby to do it last night for me (while the deadline is TODAY). I was on my simple cotton shirt (about to go to bed), I am tired, so is hubby.. I told him the reason I need the picture and I don't want to look straight and smile (please la, knowing that I am so tired with blood shot eyes, I don't think it would be a good idea to smile...).

Anyway, we sort of get it done. In less then 3 mins. Supermodel just know how to post well and fast! Wakakaka!

Well, I wanted to do it last week but then hubby was on an oversea assignment....is this a good excuse??

This morning, I did some touching up. Ahhhh...too many 'pot-holes' on my face. I don't want to cause uneasiness in the board y'know...ahem...

When I was almost done and actually quite satisfied with it whilst the bugger, Jien, walked in and saw my picture on the screen.

'Mama!!' he exclaimed; when I am about to ask him if the picture is NICE...he blurted out first and said

'Big mole, VERY BIG mole, mama...!!'

Duh....

Big House

Another project went on site a good 5 months back. Now it is progressing good to the 1st Floor superstructure.

I personally find the house TOO BIG. But the owner wants it ....duh...They still find the house a bit small in fact. Gosh, for a family of 5, well, you gotta be kidding me. God bless the maid! Including the terraces, the house is almost 9,000 sq.ft.!! If you average out, each person is living in a space as big (excuse me, bigger!!) as my whole apartment!

I have a natural fond for the other house I was blogging. They were actually on the same street, owners were both brothers but with different tastes. One prefer grandeur and English style, the other modern tropical. I prefer the scale for the latter.

Nevertheless, I love the dining area of this house!! It is going to be of full height seamless, joint-butted tempered glass so that the diners will have an undisturbed view of the fish pond next to it. Picture shown here is the unfinished product of the dining hall. And the dining will be spared from the hot evening sun as it is facing the eastern bearing. It should be nice and cozy, I am certain.

Semi-D Renovation

This project went on site when Jien was about 6 months old. It was considered one of my most difficult task as the client kept having arguments with all the people involved - engineer, contractors, sub-contractors even those that were hand picked by him and nominated by him.

It is finally coming to an end. There are some features that had been stripped off from the original design - the timber screens for the front facade which now seems bare and naked to me and the U-shaped fish pond which is supposed to flow from underneath the staircase and embrace the living room. But I was glad that we could still keep the courtyard idea. The client finally sees that it is important to keep that as now the house is well lit during day time by natural sun light.


The extension work was very 'extensive' and even the staircase position was changed due to 'feng shui'.

I am quite happy with the end result. I went against the idea of having too many built-ins for instance the bedhead, bed frame, side tables etc but the client went ahead and asked the carpenter to design and built them. It looked a bit bulky to me. Nonetheless, the kitchen cabinets and others which were designed by me seems ok, hehehe...proportionately.

My other Baby!

They say when you are so into something, you are literally carrying a 'baby'.

So this is my other baby- a bungalow which is currently under construction, around 60% complete. When I was there yesterday, the roof was up with shingles. I looked just like what I had envisioned it to be. The owner wanted to change the pitch and I insisted NO NO NO. I don't want the roof to look like a fully packed 'nasi lemak'! Good thing he took my advise.

If the lousy contractor were to be a grade A contractor, the workmanship could have been better and the work could progress faster in the earlier phase and I could actually see my baby 'born' before the actual 'labor' by end March. I am rushing to help the contractor in terms of problem solving and all other design matters, including the ID work as much as possible now before CNY and before my separation from this baby next year for a couple of months!!

I just hope that I will have yet another satisfied client. I like this house! I just can't wait to see the roof up for the living area and when the HUGE fish pond and external jacuzzi pond is ready!! Hmmmm, so much excitement!

Datum KL

2 weeks ago I attended Datum KL 2008, an architectural design conference.

This is the conference that you will see almost ALL the architects in Malaysia ( we need to fulfill a minimum of 10 points for attending the cpd [continuing professional development] so as to enable us to register our practice for the following year, this conference gives 10 CPD points!) gathered at one conference! This time around we had delegates from Australia, Singapore and Thailand. For the conference had been receiving a good feedback, many architectural schools also encouraged the students to attend - which is fantastic! Nothing like this when I was a student!

Well, to explain - this is a design conference. So normally we will have some prominent architects to speak on their latest work and the conceptual development of the schemes.

This year there are young speakers, in their 30s or perhaps early 40s. Their work is totally jaw-dropping and inspiring. Among my favourite architects are BIG Architects (Denmark), Kengo Kuma (Japan), Hailim Suh of Architecture Studio Himma (Korea). Overall, all the speakers were well prepared this time and are all equally interesting in their own way. (though, I can still see some participants snoring away..., haha!!)

One of the highlights of the event is of course, we got to meet old colleagues, college mates, friends etc and have a good chat over the breaks. We have 2 tea breaks and a buffet lunch. Hubby said at any conference if the food is not ok, most Malaysian will complain. Haha! To certain degree, I agreed.

Met my ex-boss and we were both at the consensus - we felt like scraping of our design work and doing it all over again! Hahahah! I just hope the spirit of design and purity of design works of these marvelous and gifted designers will keep me going for another year till we meet again next conference.

p/s : the architectural conference is always accompanied by ARCHIDEX - which is an architecture, ID and Building exhibition, all at one go! So if you are planning to build a house, do some extension work, change your wardrobe etc, go look for some good bargain there. In this case, next year of course!!

Family vs 'career'

I had a good chat with my ex-boss today. I was attending a meeting somewhere in town and just right downstairs of that familiar office that I used to work. So right after the meeting, I went up to chat with my ex-colleagues and boss.

More new faces and more new projects. We had a good chat about the good old days and as usual, we had a long chat, nice chat. The first thing that was brought up was he had invited me to join them back, as 'partners', no more as a staff since I am having my practise now.

Well, I declined from the start. It was a good gesture of them but I have to say no for now. I love to lay my hand on BIG projects again since for these couple of years, I had been just working on bungalows and houses AND houses... only. I yearn to learn more and expand my knowledge. When I look at the projects, my hands and my brain got so excited! BUT the timing is just not right. I love the way my style of living now. I have no one to report to. I love it while working, I have my boy come knocking on my door calling 'mama' (though sometimes I have to admit, he interferes). But I have come to this point of my life that I wanted most of my time spent on family. I know I would miss my boy growing up and it won't come back again. NEVER. So whatever expansion and promotion - just have to wait.