Notes on things we did right, things we did wrong, etc.

What were we thinking?

Half hots in the great room.

These are the electrical outlets where part is always on and part is controlled by a switch. I spent many hours looking at the electrical plan and the first day the electrician was on the job, he and I spent three hours walking the jobsite to check and refine the plan. With all of this,  somehow we missed half hots in the great room. If you glance at the plan, it shows a bunch of half hot outlets, but these were for the original soffit light design. Duh!!!

Back bar lighting.

In our previous residence, I had installed wonderful lighting in the back bar bottle shelving. Je suis stupide! I completely forgot to include it in the plan for the Hale Nani bar. Retrofitting is in progress, but it sure would have been easier to do it right the first time.

Nice try, but...

Dining Room Lighting.

The big, fancy, imported from Italy, Hallowing suspension fixture we put in the dining room was terribly expensive (about 1/3 of our total fixture outlay) and in the end, not very impressive. It's too high--I'm trying to find 1/32" stainless steel cable to lower it--and the overall room lighting is less than spectacular. To enhance the overall lighting design, I'm going to retrofit wall sconce fixtures on the back (east wall).

Master Bath Shower Fixtures

We selected Glance plumbing fixtures from Jado for the master bath. The sink faucets are very distinctive and drop-dead gorgeous, but the "matching" shower fixture were not worth what they cost. We could have used the same Kohler Stillness fixtures we used in the lower level shower. They look great, work great and were a lot easier on the budget.

I'm so glad we...

Bruck's in the bar

Even though they were moderate budget busters, the Bruck Viola (named after a former Minn. Twins pitcher?) light fixtures are fantastic. Black when they're off, they glow a warm, almost UV violet when powered up. Perfect with the Black Galaxy top.