The shelf looked perfect.
Then I read
the fine print.

We are slowly getting to finishes.

If the substructure was about what holds the house up, the finishes are about what you actually see, touch, and live with. The tiles. The joinery. The kitchen island. The bathroom vanities. The ceiling. Every surface that has been a drawing on our moodboard is now a decision with a price tag and a lead time.

This week we went looking.

Enterprise Road first to check on joinery fittings. Then Karen for tiles and stone.

I have always wondered why competing businesses open next to each other. Hardware stores next to hardware stores. Chemists next to chemists. And if you have ever driven through Kamakis, all the meat joints are side by side, selling the same nyama choma to the same people passing the same stretch of road. Why not open somewhere else? I have never understood the logic.

Enterprise Road answered it for me. PG Bison, SLM Wood Works, Tim Sales. All on the same road, all doing joinery, and competing for the same clients. I do not know who came here first. I am glad they all did — they made my drive much shorter.

Every cut of joinery wood

I started at PG Bison.

PG Bison is the Apple Store of joinery. Different cuts of wood in different colours arranged so you can touch, feel, and see. Terra cotta, Coral, Cherry, Wheat. Yes, wheat is a colour. This was beyond me. It reminded me of our wedding where Makena chose a colour called Fuchsia. I struggled then. Colours are more her world and at Lava & Lake, she is the one managing the theme, ensuring everything follows the mood board. I just try to keep up.

I arrived knowing wood. I left knowing MDF board, particle board, backers. The different cuts, with different millimetres, what goes where and why.

Around me, interior designers moved like they owned the place. They knew each section, shortcuts between the kitchen and the joinery. Some were on video calls with their clients, holding up samples for their clients to approve. You could hear the eehs through the phone as a client somewhere confirmed yes, "that one, that colour".

I walked like I knew what I was doing. I did not know what I was doing. I was in a maze — new, unfamiliar, taking everything in while trying to look like I had been here before.

I took my time in the kitchen. I checked the shelves and the doors. The array of cuts that go to the island doors, the different finishes laid out so you can run your hand along each one. I stood there for a while, checking the mood board, snapping pictures, holding each finish up to the light.

Standing at the kitchen section, I found the shelves we would want. Good size, good feel. I felt the shelves, opened the cupboards, drew the pantry doors ajar. I was starting to like it. The price looked right. Then you are hit with the fine print. A sticker on the side with the dimensions in millimetres — width, length — but next to it, a note: "This price is not inclusive of the door, hinges, or latch."

I think Apple learnt this trick from these people. Sell the main item. Let them buy everything else. The phone without the charger. Really?

Excludes doors, handles and hinges

Get one night on us

Share your link with five people who'd appreciate this. When they sign up, you get 10% off a booking at Lava & Lake. Get 25 people on board and we'll give you a free night on us — on the house, literally, once it has one.

We're only doing this for the first ten people who hit the 25 mark. After that the offer is gone.

See how many you've referred →

Not because we need the numbers. Because the people who find this place through someone who loves it are already the right people.

Then I crossed to SLM Woodworks.

As you drive in you wonder if you are heading to the right place. There is a garage with earth movers and bulldozers. You squeeze through wondering where you are going. At the far corner is a gate. Once it opens, someone waves you through.

SLM does not have PG's flair. What it has is the workshop. Carpenters working next to every machine. One cutting particle boards, another framing doors, running tile and groove through the saw.

At PG, nobody came to help. They assume you know what you want. At SLM, I showed them our floor plans and they took it from there. They walked me through what goes where. They explained what works with what. The most reassuring thing I got from them was that before they make any cuts, they send a carpenter to your site to measure everything.

The next day, Makena and I drove to Karen.

George told us about Megha Market. George is the person who will handle the finishes at Lava & Lake. I will tell you more about him in a later issue — he deserves his own. Sam referred me to Edgah. Edgah referred me to George. Every person on this project has been through a referral.

Binaa is like a mall but for consultants in the home improvement sector. You have shops selling furniture, tiles, locks — all housed in one building and you get to walk through each.

Builders (the old DIY mall) closed in 2020 or 2021. Before it did, Makena and I had walked in looking at tools. Lava & Lake was a dream then. We bought safety helmets and a feet measure that day. I still use the feet measure.

Walking into Binaa, I felt how far that image had travelled. Those safety helmets, that feet measure, the two of us walking through Builders with something in our heads that we did not yet have words for. All of it had been moving toward this, slowly.

Eunice at Megha Market was the best salesperson we encountered across all the visits. She walked us through the porcelain stone — the feel, the finish, the difference between porcelain and sintered. Finding the stone for the kitchen island that matches the backsplash and does not break our budget was our mission. Makena was in her element. She could see her kitchen. She could see the colours coming alive. She counted the number of tile panels. She was ticking items off the mood board one by one, happy that it was coming together.

I stood next to her and watched.

We left Megha Market with a clear plan. No orders yet, only quotations that we will compare with all other vendors. June is when we buy. That is when most annual sales happen in this construction space.

At home that evening, we found a website from Dubai called Cottohome. They are well known for bedroom and bathroom accessories. Think duvets, bedsheets, bath sheets, fitted sheets, comforters. I was drawn to a category I had never seen before.

Pillow protectors.

I only know mattress protectors. I did not know the pillow needed protecting.

I showed Makena. She explained why we need it. I thought I was being fed story za jaba — a whole lot of marketing dressed up as necessity. But she was convincing.

Doors without latches, sintered stone, particle boards and pillow protectors. We have been on a crash course on this journey, and we are far from done.

If someone forwarded this to you, you can follow the build here. Know someone who should be watching this — forward it to them.