After the Kaikōura earthquake rendered his living room uninhabitable, David Turner faced a lengthy rebuild; but a dramatic new look has more than made up for it.
The room had previously been lined with plaster board and decorated with hand-printed wallpaper, but the shaking caused all the paper seams to tear. Though David could afford to put everything back as it was, he opted for the new: ‘It was time to do something different, and in particular I was looking for a surface that I didn’t have to paint or wallpaper’.
At eight metres square, with a large pyramid ceiling, plenty of windows and new carpet in a pale oyster shade, the room is full of light. David chose a prefinished plywood interior panel called PlyPlay Double Trouble to help tone the space down, delivering delightful results that he hadn’t anticipated:
‘The walls actually change with every hour of the day, providing a superb design aspect. During the day the ocean reflects off it spectacularly, making it look deep emerald green, and at night the grain seems to get slightly fainter with all the artificial light. All our paintings look really great on it, too, and it works well with the stonework around the new fireplace.’
The problem David and his builder faced was that the original house had been poorly built and so a lot of remedial work was required to level its walls. David didn’t want any visible nail holes around the edges and this meant working with a router to create a hidden fillet joint to get the finish perfectly flush, with each sheet glued in place.
Having waited a year for his living room to be reinstated, David couldn’t be more pleased with the result. What he has is a total remake of the original, which he says was always delightful, but is now lively and perfect for entertaining.
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