How To Renovate

EP65 What Can I Do Now to Make Things Easier Later?

• Tash South

Share episode

Send us a text

In this week's episode of How To Renovate, I’m kicking things off with a little personal update — I’m heading off to Barcelona for a month! It’s a working holiday (with some well-deserved tapas and sunshine), and while the podcast will be on pause, I’ll be soaking up fresh inspiration, sourcing new ideas, and lining up brilliant guests for when I’m back in September.

But back to this episode: it’s a topic I’ve learned countless lessons on – and not always the easy way! We’re talking about what you can do now in your renovation to make your future life easier. 

Whether it’s clever storage planning, flexible floor layouts, hardwearing materials, or power points that actually end up where you need them to be — I’m sharing info and tips that will save the future you some stress, time, and money down the line. 

 The most successful renovations create homes that grow with you. This means designing flexible spaces that can adapt as children grow older, work situations change, or lifestyle needs evolve. I also go into choosing materials that age gracefully and timeless design elements that allow for personalisation, and allow your home to develop and flex alongside your needs.

Your home should be more than just beautiful—it should actively support your lifestyle today while adapting to your needs tomorrow. 

I’ve seen too many people overlook these things in the rush of a project, only to regret it once the dust settles. So let’s get intentional. Let’s build homes that support the way we live — not just now, but five, ten, fifteen years into the future.

Other Episodes Mentioned:
EP24 Choosing Flooring

*******************


Hi I'm your host, Tash South I'm an Interior Designer and Renovation Consultant.
Each episode of How To Renovate is short, but brimming with practical advice to help you manage your renovation project with confidence and success.

Grab some more renovation advice & free resources and become part of the South Place Studio Renovation Community at
https://www.southplacestudio.com/freebies

Everything I teach about renovation falls within my Five Pillar Process for A Successful Renovation, to learn more about the process, head to
https://www.southplacestudio.com/pillars


Or if you want to get social, you can find us here:

Instagram: @southplacestudio

Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/company/south-place-studio

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/southplacestudio

Tash South:

Hello, it's Tash here. I'm just dropping in to give you this quick note before we get into today's episode. I'm so so lucky to be off to Barcelona for an entire month. I'll be doing kind of a working holiday type thing with the kids and the family, but I'm going for a bit of sunshine, a bit of inspiration and just some space to reset. Really, I'll be soaking up loads of new, fresh ideas, beautiful design, beautiful architecture and hopefully, some really good tapas as well. I really cannot wait. I'll be soaking up loads of new, fresh ideas, beautiful design, beautiful architecture and hopefully some really good tapas as well. I really cannot wait. While I'm away, there won't be any new episodes, but I promise it will be worth the wait because I'll be lining up some brilliant new guests and renovation topics for when I'm back. So stay tuned and make sure you're following the podcast and I'll see you in September with lots of new energy and ideas. And I'll see you in September with lots of new energy and ideas.

Tash South:

Hello, hello everybody, and welcome to this week's episode of the how to Renovate podcast. So this week I've got a good one for you. We are going to be talking about what you can do in your renovation now to make things easier for you later. Because, let's be honest here, good renovations are not only about what the home looks like, but also how it functions. The smartest renovations are not just beautiful, they are strategic and they are thought through so that they will last a long time and grow and evolve with your family, with the unit, whoever may be living in your home, with you. They will grow and evolve with you and function for you into the future as well. As now, I always say your home needs to support you, your busy daily life. It needs to be that framework that makes things easier for you, for how you live in it, the things you need to do in it. So your home needs to flex and support you as your life changes. So in this episode, let's get into it. Let's talk about a few ways of what you can do now, how you can plan now so that your home not only works for you now, it works for you in the next five years, the next 10 years, the next 15 years. Even so, let's get into the episode, okay.

Tash South:

Number one one of my biggest bugbears storage. If you've been listening for a while, you will know how much I love storage and how much I love talking about storage. But storage, think about it first, not last. So you need to start thinking about your storage at planning stage, at floor planning stage. I always plan storage into the floor plan because when you're looking at a floor plan you can see those little nooks, the awkward corners, those places that won't really be useful for furniture or much else, but they are amazing for storage. You know you can add floor to ceiling, cupboards, wardrobes, storage for specific items that can really work in their space. Make the most out of it, because if you don't have storage there, it could just turn out to be wasted space. So look at your floor plan, see where you can fit the storage in and also don't just go putting storage in. Make a storage plan. Know what you want to store, what you need to store. Make a storage plan. Know what you want to store, what you need to store. Make a list of all the items you need to store.

Tash South:

I go into so much detail on what a client needs to store, how many of each thing they have, even down to how many pairs of shoes they have, how many kitchen items they have, how many sets of cutlery, how many place settings, how many lengths, meter lengths of hanging for their wardrobe. They need really really go deep into the detail because then you know you're planning for what you need to store and you won't have that huge disappointment. And I see this a lot in new builds or developer properties, where the apartment or the home may look absolutely stunning but they've not thought about the storage. So when people move in they've got not nearly enough space to put all the things that they have because they haven't spent the time, they haven't invested in that research work to actually find out what people have and where they're going to put things. And then I always feel like that is a huge disappointment for people moving into a beautiful space that's new or just been renovated and there's nowhere to put their stuff. They have to go shop for wardrobes or consoles or additional shelving and storage items because they hadn't thought about it before, which just adds a whole nother level of doing onto the end of your renovation that you really don't need.

Tash South:

After going through the entire renovation and getting to the point where you thought you were finished and you could just move in and relax, to then have to add another layer of work on top of that can be really disappointing. So think about your storage sooner rather than later. Right at the floor plan stage, you could do things like using the understair storage in the hallway. You could do things like adding in some shelving in little nooks, where perhaps you had an awkward little space or nook that wasn't going to be great for anything else. You could add some shelves in there. You can add a cupboard, you can make it a feature and then think about that boring essential stuff. So many people design their beautiful kitchens and then they haven't thought about where to put the brooms, the mops, the buckets, the vacuum cleaner, the cleaning products. So really think very carefully about what you need to store all those boring items. Perhaps you have camping equipment, perhaps you have a hobby that requires large items. Think about where you're going to put those things and plan for it, because your future win will be you won't have to deal with that down the line and in the meantime, you're not going to have to live with that visual clutter. You will have a place for everything, which I think is what most people want. They want that calmness of having a place for everything and not living with a visual clutter around them every day.

Tash South:

Okay, moving on to number two, another one of my favourites is to plan your space that works for you now but also gives you some flexibility for later. So this again comes down to a floor plan. Can you tell that I love floor plans? I can sit for days with a floor plan just experimenting and getting it right, and actually that's what I really recommend that people do as well. Before you speak to any architects, before you speak to any contractors, examine your own life, what you need, how you live, and then look at your floor plans and see how you can best adjust your floor plan to suit you and how you want to use your space. So, how you can do this, I have a few tips for you. So make a list of what you need from your space now.

Tash South:

Let's say, for example, you're a family, you have two children. They might be quite young right now, maybe they're toddlers, maybe they're babies and lots of people think about the issues they're having right now and design their homes for right now and they don't think about the future. And I have totally been guilty of that in our own home, because when we moved in, we had one six-year-old and one brand new baby and we were thinking about putting a huge playroom for them and we wanted everything open, planned space so we could see where they were and we could all be in the space together. And now the six-year-old is 12 and the baby is six and they want their own space. We want our own space. We have this open plan living room that now we are actually going to adjust so we can close up some spaces or work with some other spaces in the house where they can have a more private space to go off with their friends if they want to have friends over. So you're. So you're learning from my mistakes always on this podcast, learning from all the experience I've had over the years.

Tash South:

So think about the future. Think about when your kids grow up. What will be different? What do you think you might want then? How would you like your home to function for you then, when the kids are older, when things change? Perhaps it's work. Perhaps you're working from home and you need to plan now for an office that works for you, that's completely private and that depends on the kind of work you do. So there's so many considerations here. So make that list of what really you need now to work for you now and make also the list of what you might need in future and see how you can make both of those work for you within your floor plan. So for us it would have been great to think about ahead and have some double doors that closed off the living area from the kitchen dining area. So now I'm going to install those retrospectively, but actually it would have been great to have thought about that at the point of building the house and included them then, because then the work would have been done now and we wouldn't have had to pay extra money and extra time to have this work done. So really think about how things are going to change in the future and how you can kind of future-proof your floor plan and your home so that it can just really work with you, it can adapt, it can, you know, change and morph easily and be more functional for you as you move into the future.

Tash South:

Okay, so that moves us on to number three, which is choosing your materials and finishes that wear well. So you want to choose materials that are going to last a long time. It is very frustrating to take the time to choose a product that you think is going to work well, to pay for it, then to pay for it to be installed and then only to find out that it's not good enough quality, it doesn't wear well, it's not easy to maintain or to clean. So all of those things are really frustrating when it comes to choosing materials and especially when it comes to the large surfaces like flooring. So actually, if you want to go back a few episodes and you can go back to episode 24, I recorded an episode there called choosing flooring, because of course, flooring is one of the largest surfaces in a home when you're renovating. So go and listen to that episode. I've given loads of pros and cons of all different kinds of flooring there. That's going to help you choose your materials well. So do go back and listen to that one if you need some advice.

Tash South:

But choose your materials carefully, test them out. Make sure that you get real samples in your hand, really test them. I have been known to order flooring samples. Stomp on them with high heels. I'd write on them with markers. Try and wipe it off. I'd spill the kids paints on there. Try and clean it off. I'd see if anything scratches it. So test your materials really well. You want to make sure. You want to make sure that it's good quality, especially when it comes to flooring everybody.

Tash South:

Flooring is a huge item. It's a huge purchase because it covers so much of the surface area of your home. It's one of the things that mainly contributes to the aesthetic of the entire home. So you want to make a really good choice there, and I would say choose the best that you can afford and really really test, experiment, do some research if it's going to be hard wearing enough and low maintenance enough for what you need and what you and the time you can dedicate to doing that. Because the last thing you want to do is get you know a floor or a surface that's really that stains easily, or you have to be really precious about it for me. Um, I don't know about you, but for me, my home is something I want everyone to feel comfortable in. I don't want to be constantly telling my kids, um, don't touch that, be annoyed if they spilled something. It's got to your home, is there to live in, it's got to be able to handle these things, and so I would just say choose really carefully when it comes to materials, and I would say you want it to be easy to clean, easy to maintain, hard wearing. You want it to age gracefully and I feel like natural materials do that well. So that's why I love choosing natural materials Wood, brass, metal, stone. I love using those in renovations. I just think they're quite classic, they age well, they last well and also, in terms of replacing, wood, can be sanded and refinished. So in terms of being eco, looking after the planet, trying to choose something that you won't have to completely replace again in just a few years time, I think is really important as well to think about when you're renovating. So your future win here is, of course, you won't need to replace those things as often. They've got a long lifespan, they're going to wear well, you're going to spend less time cleaning it and they're going to have a longer lifespan. So really think about your materials, choose well to make things easier for the future, for yourself.

Tash South:

Okay now, moving on to number four. Everybody, we're talking about power and light switches and placements. So this is one that comes up a lot when I speak to people who have renovated, who perhaps haven't planned as well, let's say, or haven't had any help with planning their renovation, or they haven't perhaps researched how they want to use the space. They've just perhaps followed the architects drawings and not really thought about exactly how they want to use their homes. I find this quite often with them is that they really often find that their plug sockets are not quite in the right place. There's not enough of them, they're not where they need to be, the light switches aren't perhaps in the right place or the circuits aren't on the correct number of circuits or switches that they might have liked to control their lighting better. So I would say here really, really carefully, look at your lighting plans. So this comes down to your electrics and your lighting plans. So again, another thing to think about really, really early on in your renovation process.

Tash South:

In my five pillar process that would come down to your planning stage, the very first pillar is to examine how you want to use your space really carefully and then think about your lighting and then put that into your floor plan so that whoever you're going to be talking to about your project knows that you've thought about it, because I know this is a really a source of frustration for people. Again, moving in right at the end to your beautifully finished home and the first thing that you go to plug in or put somewhere and there isn't a socket there where you just didn't think ahead about where you wanted to put that thing. So it can be really frustrating and also really quite upsetting for people. I've actually seen people get really upset about this because they have spent all of their time, months out of their home, tens of thousands of pounds, and then moving in these little things where they're not quite right can really be a source of frustration and annoyance. So I would say work on your lighting plan from the start. Think about where you want those sockets, those switches, how you want your lighting to work. You want your task lighting, you want your ambient lighting, you want the lighting in the correct places so that you can use your home properly, so that it can function for you better. And the thing is when you're at wiring stage, even if you have too many points let's say you put some wall lights into your floor plans and it comes to it where you're on site and you decide you don't want those wall lights there. They can easily just be closed off and you know the cables behind the wall. So if in future you want to put a wall light there, that's more easily done, but to rewire that is almost impossible to rewire once everything is plastered. To try and get a wall light or try and get a socket point somewhere where you hadn't planned for it it's almost impossible. So then that means you have to have trailing extension cords and that kind of thing, which is also really frustrating and adds to the visual clutter.

Tash South:

And moving on to our final point, everybody number five leave space to grow. So I guess this is quite similar to what we talked about with the floor plan. Stage is you want to be able to work with your floor plan that leaves some space, that leaves some flexibility for your future. So ways you can do this some of them, like we discussed in point two, where we talked about space planning for now, not for later. But also there are additional things you can do to leave space to grow now.

Tash South:

I quite like doing this in client projects actually is just leave some space to breathe. Perhaps it's a blank wall, perhaps it's a little corner somewhere without furniture, perhaps it's not absolutely cramming the entire home with immovable built-in cabinetry. It's kind of thinking really carefully about what you need now, but then still, if there's some of those spaces to grow to add as your home evolves, I think that's always quite a lovely thing A place to add some art, a place to add a beautiful piece of furniture you found at a vintage market. So just leave some space for personality, some space to grow, and I love doing that for my clients. I just think it's their homes, they want to add their personality. So I'm always quite aware of not leaving it looking like a show home. It's almost like I want them to move in on their travels. I want them to find a special piece of artwork or special thing they could put on that shelf, or special piece of furniture that they might want to put into that corner. So just leave some space to grow as well.

Tash South:

Little bit of space for flexibility, because you know life evolves and you want to give your home some space to evolve with it too. So try really hard not to box yourself into that one floor plan, that one layout or style. Try and think about the future and just what your next life stage might be. So if you're planning a renovation, just take a moment, zoom out and ask what would future me be grateful for? Think about storage, think about tech, think about light, think about materials and don't forget to leave space to grow, because a little foresight when you're renovating and planning your renovation goes a long way, everybody.

Tash South:

But that brings us very nicely to the end of this episode. I really hope you enjoyed it. I would love to know how your renovation planning is coming along. Drop me a line, drop me an email. I'd love to know. I always love to hear how it's all going and if I can help any further or with any other materials or content that I produce. That's it for this week, everybody, and I hope you found this episode useful. Give us a little share and a like if you found it useful. Maybe someone else is renovating and you'd like to share this episode with them. We'd really appreciate that. Thank you so much and I will see you in the next episode. It's bye for now.

Tash South:

For more information on my five pillar process for successful renovation, you can go directly to southplacestudiocom forward slash pillars, where you'll find an introduction to the process, which covers each of the pillars and what they cover. We also have a number of other free renovation resources. Go now to southplacestudiocom forward slash freebies. I have created some amazing freebies for you there. There is one on the process, like we just said. There is one on planning permission. There is one on kitchen design, there is another one on lighting planning. Go and check those out. There's so much free information there to help you with your renovation.