Home Show

Decisions, decisions

Full of enthusiasm, I hit the recent Sydney Home Show, prepared to gather brochures and samples and decide what my new house would look like, how it would be fitted out.

In a cavernous hall at the Convention Centre at Darling Harbour, on the last afternoon of the three-day show, the weary stall-holders looked as if they’d had enough of their own spiel. However, they gamely handed out their promotional materials and answered questions, many from would-be home renovators. There was an unaccountable number of people selling beds, and a significant number of punters taking short naps.

I’m not interested in beds. I began with a stand spruiking decking material—the plan is that my new house will have a deck, facing the fire-prone bush behind my block. ‘BAL 19!’ the stall-holder hoarsely exclaimed. Fortunately, I knew what he was talking about. Not a high enough BAL rating for me.

Then a big sign: ‘Would your deck meet BAL- 40?’ This for a ‘wood composite’ product making a big claim. ‘But not FZ!’ said the guy. Luckily I’d done my research on the whole ‘Flame Zone’ thing. Over at the Bamboo stand, they were claiming BAL 29, which was also pretty good. Attracted by the screening product, I took a bamboo brochure.

I seem to be giving a lot of focus to my new house potentially burning down, before it even exits.

I was also attracted by some rather lovely handmade bathroom basins, and attractive green shades of tiles. There was a cabinetry company which could do ‘everything’ – kitchens, bathrooms, living rooms, and libraries. But I’d need walls first, for them to measure.

I puzzled over whether I needed a water filter for the whole house (apparently the latest thing), whether an electronic front door lock with its own app is really an improvement on a plain old door handle, and what exactly to choose in the coffee machine department. Maybe I could win one in a Show Competition? I entered.

One feature of mid-century modern designers was their embrace of the latest materials, the most innovative technologies of the 1950s: think laminates, venetian blinds. So I’m not averse to the newest ideas in home building materials. Some new products, however, take a while to figure out. One stand displayed various cladding materials, said to be ‘manufactured from a silica-free material that is blended with premium acrylic resin … repairable, renewable and UV stable.’ I’m still a little unclear on what you’d use it for.

Nice shade of green. What exactly is it?

There was a fireplace display. Now, on the wish-list for my house is a double-sided fireplace, but a gas fireplace in a Passivhaus raises a big question mark. The guy on the fireplace stand was up to speed on this: ‘they won’t like an open flue’, he advised. ‘But this one can be sealed with glass.’ I took a brochure for further consideration of the fireplace question.

Wishlist: Fireplace surrounded by sandstone

I didn’t stay long at the Home Show. I was happy to take away samples of a ‘wood composite’ product for flooring, and little metal rings to decide about tapware. But very soon all the many decisions seemed to be simultaneously both far off and overwhelming.

I remembered, like a faint trauma, the last time I’d built a house, thirty years ago. By the end of that ‘era of choosing’ I’d exclaimed: ‘I don’t care what light switches we have! Do whatever you want!’

Leaving the first of what might be many Home Show visits (it’s held regularly every few months), with my brochures tucked under my arm, I wondered if I was up to all the decision-making ahead.

This floor? Or that one?