"Our desires on how we wanted the renovations to be done, were well executed...We were extremely pleased with the contractors and the standard of the works."

Home Guide did an excellent renovation job for our home in Jul-Aug 2018. Our desires on how we wanted the renovations to be done, were well executed.

Deserving special mention is Ms Lynn Khaw who did the interior design discussions and planning. She was extremely patient and noted our needs very well. She accompanied us to do the tile selections. Even the electricals. Her schedules were so well co-ordinated and done so seamlessly. There was no disruption during the entire renovation phase. In fact, it was completed two weeks in advance.

We were extremely please with the contractors and the standard of the works. Mr Pua did an excellent job in supervising and ensuring that all went well.

All in all, we are very pleased. We highly recommend Home Guide to anyone considering home improvements.

Chan Vill - Facebook Testimonial

"We like it that HG's designers work as a team, as I believe two minds are sharper than one....what differentiates good IDs from a not-so-good ones is the readiness to acknowledge arising issues as work progressed, and to be flexible to make rectifications along the way to customers' satisfaction."

Had my house interior design done up and completed by Home Guide in May. This was the 2nd time I engaged HG, the 1st was in 2003 when they renovated my Yishun 5-rm apartment. Then, Home Guide was a 'renovation' co. but I have found their workmanship - carpentry and tiling - as well as quality of the materials used, to be indeed good - after 15 yrs, things were still in good condition. We therefore made it a point to contact Home Guide, and was glad to find out they have grown larger into one of Singapore's top interior design companies. We signed up with them right away without even considering other IDs.

IDs Winson and Lance were assigned to us. We like it that HG's designers work as a team, as I believe two minds are sharper than one. We often hear complaints about IDs in general not responding to customers' text msg prompt enough, but our experience with Winson and Lance wasn't so.

As expected with every reno, things didn't go very smoothly. It was impossible to have thought about every issue, anticipate or preempt every problem. But, what differentiates good IDs from a not-so-good ones is the readiness to acknowledge arising issues as work progressed, and to be flexible to make rectifications along the way to customers' satisfaction. Winson and Lance have proved to have such a quality. As the main supervising-ID, Winson was very patient and accommodated all of our requests.

Overall, Homeguide delivered a 2nd time. Well done!

Michael - Facebook Testimonial

"Our renovation journey with them was very smooth, Winson was very cooperative and he will always go out of the way to make sure everything is perfect. In addition to that, he is very efficient, hence the work was done in a timely manner with no major delays."

We have recently engaged Winson and Lance as our interior designers to renovate our house in Punggol. It's been a great pleasure working with both of them, they both have a great working attitude and always cheerful and easy to get along with.

Prior to engaging them as our interior designers we have met several others interior designers, however what we like the most about them is their positive attitude and also the fact that they took time and patience to understand our requirements.

Our renovation journey with them was very smooth, Winson was very cooperative and he will always go out of the way to make sure everything is perfect. In addition to that, he is very efficient, hence the work was done in a timely manner with no major delays.

Over all it's been a great experience and we are really happy with our house interior and designs. We would highly recommend Winson and Lance for all interior design projects.

Kind Regards, Asra Tahir

"Overall, I must say that once the works started, I didn't suffer from any sleepless nights. The way you and Mr James Pua handled the job gave me complete peace of mind. I will not hesitate to recommend Home Guide Design & Contractors Pte Ltd to anyone looking for a good and reliable renovation contractor."

I just felt a genuine need to complement you and your Project Director - Mr James Pua for a job that was well done from start to finish.

I came across Home Guide Design via a brochure i received in my mail. Browsing through, I was impressed with the pictures and the write up about what Home Guide could offer. That was when i decided to visit your office at Leng Kee road. You attended to me and agreed to come over to my place at Kentview to do an assessment. Seeing how young you looked I had reservations about your ability to handle my job. But, as we progressed I and my wife noticed that you were confident and knew your Stuff.

What impressed me was the following:

1. Home Guide has a pretty good showroom. It helped me to decide what I wanted in terms of carpentry & fittings-feature wall, wardrobes, lightings, etc.
2. You were willing to consider incorporating my ideas that I picked up at the library, show rooms, etc.
3. Your ability to listen and seriously consider our views in your overall plans.
4. To make changes to plans even at a late stage.
5. Your team of very fine sub-contractors and workers. They were all professional and completed their respective jobs as planned.
6. Regular visits (practically every other day) by your Project Director - Mr Pua.
7. He was there to brief the contractors on specific works and to check thereafter that it was properly done. This was really very reassuring to me. He also took time to brief me whenever I met him at Kentview.
8. Your scheduling was superb. There was never a day when work stopped because a worker or contract or did not show up.
9. You completed the job well in advance of the projected completion date.
10. I need to mention your end of completion cleaning up. At first I wanted to decline your services to clean up. I thought, "what could a one man do to clean up over a day". But due to an arm injury I decided to take it up. The guy you sent over was excellent. He was meticulous and very professional. He had all the tools and chemicals needed for the job. He really impressed me. For this, I must really thank you because there was nothing for me to clean up.

I must also admit that I did consult other Interior Decoration & Design Firms before I finally settled on Home Guide.

Overall, I must say that once the works started, I didn't suffer from any  sleepless nights. The way you and Mr James Pua handled the job gave me complete peace of mind.

On this note I like to wish you and all the Staff at Home Guide for a job well done. I will not hesitate to recommend Home Guide Design & Contractors Pte Ltd to anyone looking for a good and reliable renovation contractor.

Thomas Joseph

"If you would ask me the one thing which I am most impressed with the final product, it has got to be the quality of execution. Imagine my surprise when the built-in wardrobe and wood-frame-laminated glass panels looked almost exactly like the 3D rendering! It was a like-for-like match and I was thoroughly impressed at the quality workmanship and appearance."

Throughout my lifetime, home has always been an extremely precious place to me. I love spending time at home, it’s a deep sort of affinity that I identify with dearly. For almost all my life, I lived in a 5-room HDB in Bishan, and I especially loved the corner that I slept in - even after I had moved out and my family renovated the place, I would sometimes think about the corner when I spent much of my life awake at night, pondering the meaning of life as I drifted off to dreamland.

After getting married in January 2017, my wife Linh and I looked for a resale HDB, in, to nobody’s surprise, Bishan. As a true lover of the heartland where the yellow and red MRT lines intersected, I often mentally mocked the sorrow of our dear brothers AMK and TPY for whom fate decided not to grant the Circle Line to. So close, yet so far. After securing the place, the search for an interior designer begun. My wife and I were very aligned on the vision for our home. We both loved pandas, and wanted our home to be cosy with slight touch of minimalistic. We also really liked wood, and valued deeply an open and spacious concept. Cosy, open, wood would be the three key words.

I learnt about Home Guide from a good friend of mine - her Dad was the owner of the company. While this was a pull factor, we wanted to choose the best firm for the job, so we searched intensively over a period of 4 months. We contacted over 20 firms and met about 10 from a variety of sources. This took a toll and there were times where we got tired of meeting new IDs and judging them based on their proposals and interactions. Yet we pressed on, because our intent was to live in this home for the rest of our lives (that’s probably another 60 years).

We don’t intend to move or upgrade in future, so we really only had one shot to get this right, thus we were extremely particular about the person we would work with - I think it is safe to say that our eventual designer Wanting must have felt pretty exasperated with us at times because of how demanding our requirements were. We got involved in every single detail possible (some of which mattered little, others more so), things like grouting colour all the way to innovative ways to box up toilet and air conditioning pipes. In most creative work, there is a constant battle between what is functional and what is creative.

Most creative ideas may not be functional or lack usability, whereas most functional ideas tend to be dull and boring. We ignored this rule of thumb and demanded both in our vision. As dreamers, we started off with creative, incredulous ideas, and then demanded that we find out a way to make it functional simultaneously.

A couple of examples would make this apparent. For the design phase, we didn’t work with just Wanting from Home Guide. While I really liked her thoroughness and attention to detail, I valued the creativity from another designer named Gerard from another firm, therefore we engaged both and our design meetings were with two designers providing two differing perspectives. Whereas most other projects typically take a couple of months for the design, we took an arduous 9 months, recycling over 10 layout design ideas and countless others such as reading nooks, secret, hidden doors, arched doorways and replacing walls with full-panel glass.

We would take our floor plan, erase all the walls we could hack down, and re-imagine how we could reconfigure the space altogether. You can imagine this took a lot of patience on Wanting’s part, and at times we would pivot an idea after she had prepared a drawing or 3D rendering, meaning she had to go back and redo the entire piece. I think we overshot the number of reiterations we had for 3D rendering as well.

Through it all, Wanting was patient with us and Jack, the owner, was supportive in journeying with us at critical points of the renovation process. For instance, normally people choose their wardrobe laminate colour and design based on a sample catalogue small enough to carry around in one hand.

However, knowing how painstakingly meticulous we were, Jack and Wanting went the extra mile and invited us down to the actual factory itself to decide based on the massive chunks of laminate so that we could get a more realistic feel of the designs.

The workers were surprised to see us and commented that rarely do customers go to such extents. As such, I am immensely grateful to both Jack and Wanting for adjusting and adapting to our rigorous needs.

In our modern culture of Instagram and Facebook, we know that pictures are always edited and re-edited to portray the best image possible, to showcase the person or place in the best light. As such, when the 3D rendering for our home design came out, we were impressed with the artist’s work, but we knew that reality wouldn’t match up to it and lowered our expectations accordingly.

Fast forward several months and our renovation was coming to a close. As you might imagine, we were there every week at the beginning and as the various fittings were put into place and the final touches dusted off the shelves, almost every night after work. If you would ask me the one thing which I am most impressed with the final product, it has got to be the quality of execution.

Imagine my surprise when the built-in wardrobe and wood-frame-laminated glass panels looked almost exactly like the 3D rendering! It was a like-for-like match and I was thoroughly impressed at the quality workmanship and appearance. If you don’t believe, take a look at it yourself. The pictures don’t lie, and this really stood out for Linh and I. A brilliant concept is only as good as the quality of its execution, and oftentimes creative ideas fall short not because of the intent, but the implementation.

In terms of improvement, I can only think of one, which is perhaps specific to our project as well. One of the things I really value is a consistent barrage of innovative ideas to bounce off and discuss, debate, and explore. Creativity without boundaries is easy, but creativity within boundaries such as a 2.6m ceiling is challenging. While many ideas were customised and highly specific, I still felt more could have been done in terms of pushing the limits and peering out for rare insights. This may involve ideas such as creative linkage and integration of futuristic trends such as technology and the Internet of Things into traditional designs.

The journey of renovation was a deeply personal one for my wife Linh and I, involving not just calculations and concepts, but our entire being, heart and passion poured into the project. We left no stone unturned, and expected Home Guide to do the same. After visiting our home, many people ask Linh if she would consider being a designer because she came up with many of the most innovative ideas in our home. She said no, because she didn’t think she could do this again due to the mental and emotional energy required.

We are deeply grateful to Wanting, Jack, Home Guide and our other designer Gerard for journeying with us through this process. There were many moments where we weighed pros and cons, debated or reset ideas completely. It was frustrating and stressful, and I’m sure Wanting probably wanted to pull out her hair at times even though she always put on a calm, professional front. Probably she complains about our project to her colleagues over lunch. Yet not once did we falter or downsize our vision, but kept our eyes fixed on the end goal through it all. And it is a testament to Wanting and Jack for not only their stellar ability to execute, but the fluid adaptability to meet our consistent demands as a couple heavily invested in a project which will last us a lifetime.

Thanks be to Wanting, Jack, and all from Home Guide who worked on our home. May it be that years later, when I walk into the master bathroom and turn on the tap to see water droplets streaming into the Villeroy & Boch water basin, that I recall the time we shared together. We richly enjoyed this journey, and we hope you did too.

"Thank You Sushi! Good work from Everyone. We are happy and pleased with your teamwork and the good teamwork displayed by everyone. Thank you."

Jess.

Thank you Sushi for supervising the renovation works in good time.

Shirley

"My husband and I are very appreciative and grateful to you and your team, especially Lynn and James, for the excellent service in supervising, providing the immediate help and support to those issues we've raised during the house reno"

Once again, our sincere appreciation to you for your professional advice, close supervision on-site, generous discount and the complementary quartz slabs to complete the kitchen beautifully. No issue is too difficult for you. We're very satisfied with the whole reno work.

Yishun owner.

"He made the whole process of renovation easy for me by overseeing every detail and hence, relieved me of additional stress, allowing me to concentrate on the business instead. Also, every time we met a hiccup, he was there to rectify and propose alternatives readily."

We engaged Home Guide Design & Contracts Pte. Ltd. for the purpose of renovating our shophouse into a retail space unlike any other in Singapore. As we already had what we wanted in mind, the priority came down to pricing and the ability to fabricate our ideas to reality without having to compromise much on the aesthetic finish.

Lance our interior designer was on board from day one and was very attentive and accommodating to our requirements and requests. He also had a lot of fresh ideas to contribute to the project and was there every step of the way. He made the whole process of renovation easy for me by overseeing every detail and hence, relieved me of additional stress, allowing me to concentrate on the business instead. Also, every time we met a hiccup, he was there to rectify and propose alternatives readily.

The biggest and probably most challenging part of our project was the shop facade that was designed to simulate a typical shopfront in Paris. It posed many challenges such as, angles leading to the doors, large windows and details of curved motifs. As such, I was nervous and a little apprehensive of the outcome. I have to say the outcome was an extremely pleasant surprise and we were contented with the workmanship that was delivered.

Even after the project was over, Home Guides' after service care is highly mentionable. Although we faced some minor issues after completion, Home Guide was quick to arrest and rectify them.

Overall, we are happy we worked with Home Guide and will be happy to work with them in future as well. It was a great experience for us and you can rest assured that your project will be in good hands.

Thank you Home Guide!
Velma Manoharan Director
Marmotte Private Ltd.