The one post where I am not complaining about the neighbors... well sort of.

Until a few days ago, we weren't 100% sure about the exterior finishes for our house (Yup, a little scary since we have started construction... hum hello... maybe we should be busting our asses to figure it out. Well maybe if we were not wasting so much time on the assholes neighbors next door, we would have made up our minds already).

We actually have tried several ideas, all satisfactory but always felt that we could push the design a little bit farther. However, without an architect on board, it is sometimes difficult to make a decision (I can't believe I am writing this). Well, it is not that it is difficult (let's not exaggerate, it's not rocket science either), it is just that you are constantly wondering if the decision you are making is the right one. 

At any rate, we were driving around on the week-end and spotted a very cool house with a finish that we had looked into in the past but kind of left aside as we were not sure about it. We had only seen examples on brochures and it really didn't convince us. Turns out that it looks super awesome in real life so we are now strongly considering it for the front of the house. It is called Prodema, it is a high density, resin core panelling faced with natural wood coasted with a proprietary acrylic finish. I know, it sounds really exciting... It is made in Spain (I love Spain.) and it can endure really though weather conditions, which is why it is good for our application. It comes in various colors but the one we like is called Mocca and here is a picture of it. Not only is it sharp and beautiful (kind of hard to tell from the picture), but it is also very interesting when applied as cladding, because it comes with a riveting system that looks totally cool and architectural.

I have to say, I am pretty relieved and happy. This might just do the trick and give our house the extra kick it needed. Of course, we have to price it and figure out how much it will cost. It might be a wash with the other finish we were supposed to use.  I am keeping my fingers crossed because I truly love it. I hope it won't cost an arm and a leg. We showed it to our super-nice builder and he absolutely loves it, he was thrilled about it and is excited to use it. Phew ! That's another thing we would have had to worry about had we kept an architect on board: every revision, big or small, (granted, this is a big one...) would have been billed for and every change would most likely have been accompanied with a huge guilt trip (I can hear the architect: "What???? You want to change the door knobs, that's outrageous! I am going to have to charge you, that's way more work for me and I don't work for free". O_o). Our builder is easy going, he doesn't care as long as we are happy. 

Apart from that, the construction is going very well, the shoring has almost been completed, the neighbors-from-hell have left us alone over the past few days, which doesn't mean anything. These people are so vicious that they are probably cooking something poisoneous for us. Expecting the worse, but hoping for the best though, always.