This week my business partner Steph Bron and I from The DIY Doers answer some of our Sunday Times questions, sharing tips on how to stop your floorboards from becoming draughty.
www.theDIYdoers.com
I chat with property expert and presenter Amanda Lamb as we discuss her TV shows A Place in The Sun and Flat Pack Home.
Sponsor: To take advantage of the generous 15% discount from my sponsor Thorndown, please visit http://bit.ly/TVCarpenter. Discount code: TVCarpenter
Contact me: Wayne Perrey on Twitter and Instagram.
Music: "What's the Angle" by Shane Ivers
To learn how to achieve a Safe, practical and beautiful home,
join THE DIY DOERS Facebook group
This week my business partner Steph Bron and I from The DIY Doers answer some of our Sunday Times questions, sharing tips on how to stop your floorboards from becoming draughty.
www.theDIYdoers.com
I chat with property expert and presenter Amanda Lamb as we discuss her TV shows A Place in The Sun and Flat Pack Home.
Sponsor: To take advantage of the generous 15% discount from my sponsor Thorndown, please visit http://bit.ly/TVCarpenter. Discount code: TVCarpenter
Contact me: Wayne Perrey on Twitter and Instagram.
Music: "What's the Angle" by Shane Ivers
To learn how to achieve a Safe, practical and beautiful home,
join THE DIY DOERS Facebook group
On today's show. I'm joined by my business partner, Steph Brahm from the DIY doers as we go through some of us and the times home questions, one of them being how to reduce drafts from your flow boards. And I have the pleasure of interviewing the wonderful Amanda Lamb as she tells us about a place in the sun and how Brexit might affect that show. And she gives us the insight into creating a flat pack home. A huge thank you to Thorne down for sponsoring this podcast. What's been great is this week I actually went down to their home and they live in Glastonbury in the lovely village of Glastonbury and they have their, their workshops in their factory there. And we went down and we, me and my daughter went down there and we met them and I interviewed them for the next series of, uh, the podcasts. So they've agreed to sponsor, continue sponsoring and supporting the TB. Couple of podcasts. But while I was there, I got to ask them a load of questions. And what was really interesting is I never knew that yes, they have an amazing range. If you look on their website phone down.co. Dot. UK, you'll see they've got a brilliant, um, color palette range and you can pick from and that they're named wonderful colors and they're really inspiring. But also they can color match almost. They've got a machine there which does, uh, I think 1800 Raul colors and ask them about that. RAL colors is like industry trade colors. So if there's a certain color that particular that you really like, you could contact them and they could make it bespoke for you. It's like a RAL color chart. So if you can't find a color on their color chart that they've gotten their website, if you go onto the Raul website, I believe you can look up and find a color matte, like their trade colors. So the options are, are endless. Uh, again, like I say, if you want to find any more information about thorn down at there, eco paints and all their credentials go to thorn down.co. Dot. UK. And because they're amazing, they're giving my podcast listeners 15% discount. So all you have to do is putting in the discount code is the word TB carpenter, so you can enjoy 15% off. The great thing about answering the Sunday times how a magazine DIY questions with my business partner, Steph Bron is we get sent so many interesting questions so we thought we'd sit down and answer a few for you on the podcast. So listen out and see how we can help stop the draft coming in from under your skirt.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:One of the questions we had, um, from the Sunday times was regarding like a mucky March on the edge of, of a car pay. Yeah. And there was lots of different debates about this. I've seen this quite a few times about, someone's even mentioned it on our DIY, do his website. The genius. Honestly, I think I'm only because I discovered this from, I'm working, I'm doing a new build house because obviously houses are really dusty and really mucky. Um, and I, I remember, especially on our website, there are a lot of people commenting on it saying it can be lots of different things. But the one thing that I realized works is it's the dust behind the skirting board. Yeah. So when you know new bills or any house who's got a load of dust behind the, a load of a load of mess. But if you don't Hoover out the dust from underneath the skirting boards before you lay the carpet, you get this like an air flow that comes in and out of the rooms and brings a dust in and out of the car page. So ended, I think this was the woman who wrote in for the time, she had like a cream carpet and she'd had this dirty Tidemark that went all the way around
Speaker 3:cutting in that area and she thought it was like a sort of static problem or something, you know, that was, why was it all being attracted there? But you're right, is the air flow. Yeah. Um, and obviously that's an area where there is going to be that sort of thing going on
Speaker 1:and you kind of want the[inaudible] you want, you don't want a, you know, you know, you want ventilation, you want it, you know, air bricks underneath your floorboards. But we also suggested that some of the old Victorian houses you could, you could even seal the area, put some silicone in there even, you know, to below the skirting boards if the gap is
Speaker 3:yeah. But it said all the carpets fitted before. Yeah. Well that would be more helpful. Yeah. Yeah. But then what we recommended to this lady was to actually gently find an area where she could get at that bit of carpet and just try and lift it. Yeah. So obviously you're going to have your grip rod around the edge, which is sharp. So just being a little bit careful. But if you could get a kind of pallet knife or something under one bit and then get hold of it, just gently pull it away as long as you can push that carpet back on the, into the grippers. Yeah. Once you're done and then just Hoover under there. I mean it's something that in old houses it's gonna sort of accumulate a lot of the time you can get that area clean with a decent attachment on your[inaudible] mean but sometimes it just doesn't clean doesn't it? And I think the only solution then really is to try and pull it away. But just being aware of is it under the skirting board, is it butted up to the skirting boards? There's a few things to consider as you put it back. You're not going to end up with any loose.
Speaker 1:But also as well, we've seen it a lot. You get a lot of movement in houses so you know your floor might drop a little bit, which means you're skirting board almost floats a little, you've got some time but like a centimeter gap all the way around. I know my parents had an old Victorian house and you saw the gaps under the skirting and people have asked us about like how to seal this. So we, you know, we suggested you could silicone it, you can seal it with clear sealant, but you can buy long strips of cork, which they sell when you're doing laminate flooring and long long strip thin strips of cork that you can put in that gap. And the brilliant thing about cookies, it squishes and contracts and expands. So as your house moves or as your laminate flooring, it's a floating floor. It needs to contract a move. You can wedge that in the gap. So even if you've got big gaps, if you've got natural wooden floorboards, you could put cork in the gaps there. So they'll move all the time, but they stopped the airflow and the stop drafts coming through.
Speaker 3:So you can buy it in little flat
Speaker 1:long strips. Yeah, it's like long strips of beading almost wherever you, if you've got the, like Wix or any of your DIY stores, if you go where they sell the laminate flooring, then there's an area where they sell you on the lay, they sell the miters, the settle, all the beading basements. You just buy a pack of them and they're normally black, Brown cork strips.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I don't know that. Also, just while we're on the subject of cork, it's, um, a bottle, a court from a bottle is a really great thing to plug a hole. So I move a lot of radiators for people who have exposed wooden floors. And if you're moving that pipe work, obviously you've got a hole where the pipes coming up from under the floor to serve and then you're moving that. So you're left with a hole in your wooden floor most of the time because you know, the pipe would probably be 15 mil and the hole probably 19 male, the cork from a bottle of wine, you know, so you've got to drink it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, and then it will fit,
Speaker 3:you know, literally map with a hammer or whatever, get it in the hole. And it, like you're saying, it allows that sort of expansion and that's[inaudible]. And it just takes your eye away from having a holiday. And also the whole will be a gap. It could be somewhere that little mice, MLC might come in, blah blah blah. Yeah, that's a really good little tin what to do to fill those kind of holes. But I didn't know about the strip of course.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's interesting you were saying about mice. Um, they come, you know, they can get through loads of little holes and stuff. Um, why a wall is if you've got holes in areas that you know, might come through, they know through everything, but why a wall, they can't bear it on their teeth. So you can buy Sunbrella pad and you can buy lots of it. It's good. Just have holes with Brillo pad. Like why a wall that'll help stop the mice coming through as well. I have a confession to make. I'm absolutely gutted. A few weeks back I interviewed Amanda Lamb, you may remember her from the Scottish widow adverts. Now I've known Amanda Lamb, especially her husband. I worked with her husband on the great interior design challenge and interior design show a couple of years ago. He is a cameraman through him. Amanda and I would speak cause on social media and I, at one point I was going to help do some um, carpentry in her house and we talked about different options and different things like that. So when I was doing the podcast, I asked her, she be involved and she said absolutely I would love to be. Um, so we had a really lovely telephone conversation and asked her how she became to be a presenter of all things property related and the was amazing. And then it wasn't entirely listened back. I realized that like the first 10 minutes of it, there was this weird interference and what had happened is am I phone must have been near the microphone and it had this weird clicking sound. I tried to edit it and run it through some software and we just both sounded like robots so I could include it. But then as a continued listening trying to fix, I realized that actually two thirds of it wasn't affected at all and it was perfectly fine and there was nothing wrong with it. So at least I managed to salvage or use two thirds of it, which just means the intro is not there. So we've lost the beginning, but I'll fill you in and what, what we said and it was really lovely chatting with her and finding out, you know, how she became to do what she does. Um, I didn't know that. I knew that she was the Scottish widow model from, I think she did that campaign, I think she was like 12 years. It was the lighthouse spit where, you know, she walks on a cliff tops in a long Cape in a Scottish widow advert. She started out as an a stage and she worked in a state agent for about five years. And then when she was 20 she went to a trade show clothes show live and got asked by four different model agencies if she wouldn't mind modeling. So she gave up being on the stage and to be a model. And that's where she did the campaign and did various different campaigns and did the Scottish widow. And then she was approached by a place in the sun, the TV show, because they knew she was a model, but also they knew that she had a stage and background and she went and did a screen test and they gave her her first job. And from that she's worked solidly in the world of TV. So, um, you know, she plays in the sun, you know, she's done selling homes with Amanda Lamb and she does loads of, uh, different, various, uh, uh, property shows and shoes. She does a lot of the trade shows as well. And we talked about the place in the sun and then we, and then we talked also about flat pack home. She's got a program where she talks and guides people through buying kit homes. Like there'll be hoophouses and different programs like that, but luckily am I to salvage all of that and all of that is usable. So here we pick up as I were talking about place in the sun and I talk about how Brexit is going to affect the show
Speaker 4:and then the dreaded word and I caught, they're mostly saying this Brexit damn different for you doing that show. Like when, when obviously it brought to happened, like what's been there, what it must have been the main topic of conversation with all your producers.
Speaker 5:I can remember when we, when, when we got the boat through and uh, it was funny. I, I've now still, we had a puppy, he's now three, but I remember when Donald Trump was elected and when the Brexit vote came through both times I got up early to that. The pocket. Yeah, out for a week. I'm like, like that's it. Every time I let you out for a week, something, 2000 trips just, Oh yeah. I remember when I first saw that I'll probably be in quite shocked cause I think that we were going to vote leave.
Speaker 4:I think in our Facebook world we, we will, well I don't know anyone who would want to leave. And then that I think you've got, that's why it was so, so shocked because we were in a bubble.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely. Um, but when I found out about it, I did think, well that's it. We're stuffed. You know, there's a way places some will continue, but it does, you know, it's just been recommissioned but think another hundred and 20 episodes. But I think it's the sort of thing where you, it's like a queen and none of us have a crystal ball, so none of us may what's going to happen. But I think it will be more challenging. The, the actual process of buying a home or books will be more challenging. But when you think about it, you know, there are a lot of countries that aren't in the EU and they're buying in, in Spain and France and Italy. So I don't think it will stop us being able to do it, but I just think it might be it, you know, there might be a few more hoops one needs to jump into, to be honest with you. In some ways. That's probably not a bad thing because I think a lot of people got quite to the max today's clue about what, you know, just, I remember my mum bought a house in France and basically didn't listen to anything that I said, you know, use local. No, Ted didn't get solicited and get survey data. Unfortunately it works out here, but for a lot of people they don't use it and then they just find contracts in languages that they've got no idea that, you know what it's saying. So I maybe not like, let's say Brexit is a good thing, but I think maybe in a way it will make people have to work just that little bit harder to get it, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing.
Speaker 4:No, actually, yeah, due diligence will, we'll prove. Yeah,
Speaker 5:but I still haven't got a scoop. You do what's going on every time I wake up in the morning, I think, well if we go, Oh no we don't. Yes, he told me like fix for me. Can't keep up.
Speaker 4:I know. And like I said, both my family, I've got places there and they're just like, well, do we sell it? Do we not sell it? You know, nightmare.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it's very, very hard.
Speaker 4:It is, um, flat pack home now this is, this is living my dream. So you this I, you know, I everyone dreams of building their own house and, and, and for me it stemmed from there. I say at the competition like GRA grand design. When an old couple made a Huff house, they got the, and that, I don't know if you remember seeing that episode, but that's third on that whole idea. My dad's a builder, so my dad's built houses from scratch. Um, and that series, but what always interests me, you can answer some technical questions. Mortgage wise. Can you get a mortgage on a kit house?
Speaker 5:You have to, I mean, the best thing to do if you're thinking of buying one is to go and get your finances in place before you even start. I mean, you know, most financial advisors will be able to tell you that. I'm sadly not financially quite so. But you know, I think you probably, I mean I'm sure you can, but I think you would need to make sure, I think the thing is with, with kit homes is they're amazing. I mean, they are, they go up really fast. Um, I remember filming off, turning up to film on, um, one day and the roof was going on. And you know what it's like when you turn up to film, there's a lot of faffing about isn't made. Everyone needs a cup of tea and then the sound man's got to get stuff out. And so we'd all gone into this lady's house to get ready and sort of go through the script and work out what we'll be doing. And by the time we'd done it, we've let me about an hour. The roof was like, no, not yet.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Undo that. Cause that happens on interior design shows, like, can you just cut that piece of water again?
Speaker 5:No, I've already done it. But the great thing about flatpack is, is that they do go up incredibly fast. They are, you know, environmentally fabulous. Um, there's so many different types now. You know, we did sort of six bedroom detached Oak framed buildings and then we did the little granny annexes in the back garden. And what I love about it is, is the speed and the ease of the, you know, as long as you get a good recommended company. I mean there are lots of the German ones for example, not the half houses, but there were lots of German companies where it's all done. You have to go over to Germany and you spend two or three days choosing door handles, door frames, kitchen cupboards, work tops. And then they just bring it over, put it all together. So depending on how well you are at making decisions on it cause otherwise you'd be there going like, Oh God, do I go blue green?
Speaker 4:Yes. And I was just going to say the best piece of advice for someone choosing, cause it's like, cause it's a new world. If you are, you know, if you've got your mortgage in place, you've got, luckily you've got a plot of land somewhere, you know, um, what, what's the biggest piece of advice because you've seen so many people do this now.
Speaker 5:Yeah. I think the biggest piece of advice, well number one, make sure you've got your finances in place. You know, make sure you can afford it. I mean, the good thing with a flat pack as opposed to sort of a conventional build is your, it nine times out of 10 your cost is set at the very beginning so you're not going to get things spiraling out of control. You know, sometimes as well, you know, when you do a build yourself, things go wrong or something happens or things that you haven't foreseen, you know, occur and you have to add an extra whatever. I mean, I always say to people, if you're building a house and they say it's going to take 12 months, it'll take 16 months and if they say it's going to cost 200,000, it'll cost 300,000. So you know, whatever you do, it's always going to cost a bit more. But the good thing with backpacks is that you have to figure out from there and then, so make sure you've got your finances in place and you know exactly what you're, what you're dealing with. If you can and you choose a company that you liked and you trust, ask them to go and have a look at other houses that like bill. Cause I think that's quite important. You know, walk around them, open the doors, turn the taps on, all of that sort of thing. Sort of look at the quality of the and see what you're getting. I mean there are some companies, um, there's one called boarder OPA that we worked with and they would find the plots of land for you and then build the house on top. Um, have a very good idea about how you want the property to look. That's also quite important, you know, so think about your flooring. Think about, you know, um, the colors that you want to use. Think about your kitchen, work out, spend some time on the pot, working out the landscape. You know, what, where does the sunrise, where does it set, cause if you've got a big plot and you want to build the family house, you know, you can really have a lot of fun with it, but don't rush into anything. I think that's probably, um, a piece of advice I would give as well.
Speaker 4:No, it's like very much try before you buy, if you can go like the fact that you can go to their factory sometimes and walk through them. Um, would you ever consider getting a, a flat package?
Speaker 5:Right. Well, funny you should say that because, um, I mean I, the house that we live in at the moment, we live in a Victorian townhouse, which I adore. I've always loved it. It's a very higgledy, piggledy house. You know, it's sort of lots of different levels and lots of different, um, you're the bedrooms, things are on lots of different levels. But I was just thinking, um, my teenager when she becomes a teenager, Willow, my eldest, so she, she'll be 11 in February and at some point, you know, when she's about 18 or 19, we've got the pathic space at the Boston of the guard, which at the moment has the trampoline in the shed. Those two, those going, yeah, point that one out. But I'm going to put a flat hat down there. Yes. Yeah. Because as lovely as this house is, it only has three bedrooms. So if ever we have anyone to stay or you know, the kids want people, it can be a bit snug, but building a flat pack that could become a guest cottage or place her to go in, you know, sleeping. Definitely. Yeah. In a few years time. That's, that's next on the list.
Speaker 4:Next on this. Now at the end of my podcast, I always ask my, um, the person I'm interviewing to describe to me, it could be something that you already have or it could be, um, your, your dream version of. And I want you to describe, uh, describe your dream. Um, I was normally two rooms. It's interior designers, but for me, I'm going to say, can describe your dream home and also while you're in it, what are you drinking while you're there?
Speaker 5:Oh, okay. Well that's easy. The older, the better. My dream home would be a Georgian Manor house somewhere in the, um, Somerset or Devin countryside. Um, I would like lots and lots of fireplaces throughout cause I love, I love the idea of fires and candles and you know, and I'd be very eclectic in my style. One of my, one of my kind of design, um, heroes is Pearl low. So she basically, I basically like Paulos house if ever you look it up, look it up.
Speaker 4:Oh my God, I listened to her on the podcast with, I'm Sophie. Have you heard it? Have you listened to the podcast? That sounded amazing. Didn't it that has, you can
Speaker 5:see her house online and yeah, basically I'd like Pearl Lowe's house if that's you guys cold. You need lots of fireplaces. She said she'd be out the terrorists and then in the winter months I would be by this fire having a lovely Chilean. Nice, nice notes. I've done[inaudible]. Absolute pleasure speaking to you darling. Thank you. So nice to speak to you too. Thank you very much. Bye bye. Bye.
Speaker 1:How cool was that? I've always wanted to build my own home and I think a kit home would be a great way forward. Some of the designs are absolutely brilliant and Amanda was a real good sport and he was great to chat with her. I hope you enjoyed the conversation I had with my business partner staff as we gave you some top tips from us and their time home help section and as always, just thank you for you guys. We're on episode 12 we've done a whole three months of podcasting and podcasting terms. That's amazing. Everyone said after episodes seven most people drop away. So the fact that we've made it to 12 and you guys continue to listen is brilliant. We're going to have a little bit of a, a ketchup for the next two weeks. I'm going to take a little bit of a break and what I want to do is create two amazing episodes just just showcasing the last 12 weeks and some of the best bits from some of the guests that have had on the podcast. And what that enables me to do is it means I get to regroup and focus on how to make season two of the TV carpenter even better than this season. What I'm pleased to say is I finally can release all the interviews I've done with all the contestants from interior design masters. Contractually I wasn't allowed to release them until the show or dead until it had gone out on Netflix. So I'm pleased to say that we'll be starting with Cassie, the winner of interior design masters and then we'll be going through and speaking to the rest of the contestants. Um, so you'll have to keep listening and hearing all about those. I've actually interviewed Cassie today and it was absolutely brilliant. I'm going to be also asking if you have any questions for any of the other contestants. So look out on all my social media is and if you have any questions for Frank, did you um, Nicky, any of them, let me know and I can try and put those to them so that we can answer all those inside questions that you've always want to know. Um, how they experience being on the show. A huge thank you to thorn down for sponsoring this episode and I'm really pleased to say that they've agreed to continue sponsoring the T V carpenter and they'll be here with us for season two. If you would like some more information about thorn down, don't forget, you can go to thorn down dot code at UK and if you'd like 15% discount, you just put in the code the T V carpenter. And remember, if you have any questions for me, um, you can contact me, Wayne Perry on Instagram or Twitter, if you have any guest ideas, if there's people you would like me to interview, if there's anyone in the world or any shows that you'd like me to try and find out who works on it, who works behind it. I'm quite lucky that I've got quite a few contacts within this industry, so I'm sure I might be able to get them on. And I forget. I said before you can contact me on those social medias on Instagram or Twitter. I hope you've enjoyed listening to the podcast. I hope it's inspired you to pick up the tools and maybe have a go and also giving you the confidence to create your dream home. And all I have to say now is, and keep listening to the TV carpenter.