Design by Beth: Chunky, but in a good way!

I hate the word chunky. But I couldn't think of a better way to describe the moldings I was after. Of course my builder, and my brother, also a builder, could and did. How about casings, crowns, wainstcots, panels, base and sills? How about ranch, reeded, fluted, colonial, architrave, victorian, traditional? Honestly, it's enough to make my head spin. Much easier to just yank out a picture, show it to your builder and say THIS. Open up those design books and blogs and look for what you love.

Love that Brooke Giannetti. Here's an entrance she did that struck me for two reasons. Number one, I love the panels on the walls and the moldings. Number two is the spectacular staircase taking a starring role here. I adore the wood steps and the white risers. That's going on my list of "must haves".

The Brooke Giannetti picture that convinced me I had to add panels to my walls. Turns out if you don't do all the extra trim inside and just go craftsman style, it's fairly inexpensive for a big impact.

So this is what I showed my builder and he nodded and said "yep", Jim is great that way. Then he said "and you're planning on doing your doors the same way right?" I must add at this juncture that it is perfectly ok to lie to your builder as long as it won't set back the remodeling process. "Of course, that's exactly what I planned," I told him.

After a few disastrous attempts at picking out baseboard, my brothers finally helped me out and selected it for me.

The crown was pretty easy. Once Jim had an idea of what I was going for, he just selected it for me. Have I mentioned that having a builder you can trust is probably one of the most important aspects of a good remodel? If you're working, you're going to be leaving your house open for this person. You're going to be relying on him or her to ask the right amount of questions. Not too many that you're better off just being on site, and not too few that when you get home you say "oh wow, what would make you think I didn't need a door there?"

Jim came highly recommended by my brother who had worked with him on many jobs. He had a great design sense and made decisions I would have made. As my brother said to me, you want someone that would do things the way you would and not take the shortcut. I never had to track him down, he was there when he said he would be and he accomplished things very quickly. Also important to me, he never scoffed at my ideas but talked them through with me and came up with great solutions.

So my advice would be to get recommendations from people you can trust. If you're going to do a huge job, start with a small one and see how it goes first. Look at their portfolio of work. If you have a tradesperson that you trust, like an electrician, plumber, or installer, ask them which builders they like to work with. Many times these insiders have better information because they know who's doing clean work, who's consistently busy and who they can trust when they need to be paid.