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Luxury Condo Design Build in Toronto

Having an entire house isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. All of the yardwork must be done yourself, and the property costs can really eat up your savings. Instead, owning a condo comes with many of the same benefits of an apartment. Plus, they’re easier to fit into those tight city lots, which just so happen to be closer to all of the work opportunities Toronto has to offer. If you’re looking to capitalize on these truths, you may be considering building a condo. Let’s check out the perks of luxury condo design build in Toronto.

What Is Design Build?

First and foremost, you may be wondering what design build is. This is a term that is becoming more and more common in real estate, so now is the time to learn it. Design build is simply the idea that one team should do the designing and building.

Design build is the perfect solution for someone who doesn’t enjoy being a middle-man. And who does? Instead of working with a design team and then passing their blueprint off to a construction team, get it all in one. Then, when your construction team has questions about something on the blueprint, you don’t have to shrug your shoulders. They can, instead, ask the designer on their very own team, since they’re the one who made the design.

Design build ensures the design and construction process goes much smoother than it would divided. If you want to save time and effort, this is the way to save both.

What Is a Luxury Condo?

Now, to many people, the idea of a condo is a luxury in and of itself. After all, most people who don’t buy homes end up renting. But being able to buy a condo in the heart of Toronto isn’t the only luxury we’re offering. A luxury condo – like any type of luxury home – comes with more.

Firstly, there’s the difference in technology. Luxury condos may include technology such as intercoms, biometric security, and smart appliances. Ever wanted to control your thermostat without leaving bed? You can do that these days with a smart thermostat controlled from a smart phone. Modern day condos can come with any number of smart technology, improved security, and more.

And, second, there’s the difference in quality of life. A normal apartment may have forced air or baseboard heating. A luxury condo, on the other hand, could have heated floors. Additionally, bathrooms could have radiant towel warmers to keep your bathroom warm and assist in drying your used towel. Stepping out of the shower just got a lot more comfortable!

Luxury Condo Design Build in Toronto

If you’re interested in building a luxury condo in Toronto, Heidan Construction is your team. We do design build all over the GTA and specialize in luxury homes and offices. Want a quote? Need your questions answered? Call us today and we can discuss the possibilities.

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Using Dark Colors to Achieve a Luxurious Interior

If you’re like many people, you grew up hearing that dark colors are bad interior design. Since the turn of the century, homes have just gotten whiter and beiger with time. Contemporary home design of 2023 has hardly any color left in it – at least if you do it like popular media and celebrities think you should. But, there are ways to use dark colors to achieve a luxurious interior that time simply cannot overpower. Let’s take a look at some of them.

Dark Wood and Light Wood

One of the most timeless ways to achieve a luxurious interior that incorporates darkness is by using dark and light wood. 70’s particle-board wood paneling has given wood interiors a bad name. You might not think you like a lot of wood in your interior, but you may be wrong. Getting it to look amazing requires some color balance.

In order to make your interior look timeless and attractive with a lot of wood, use a very dark, desaturated wood, with a very light, desaturated wood. Woods with more color to them can become overwhelming in large amounts. Whether that tint is red or yellow is irrelevant. Desaturated wood, on the other hand, is perfect in large quantities.

Whether you use light or dark wood as the accent is up to preference. One wood should be used for exposed, wooden ceilings – crossbeams included – and flooring. The other should be used for accents, such as furniture. 

Picture dark wood, nearly black, above and below you. Then, in the middle of it all, a light wood table and chairs with a black runner on it. The visual is stunning!

Black and Gold

If you intend to incorporate a lot of black into your home, the most important way to prevent that darkness from swallowing the house is by counteracting it with rich colors or stark white. While nearly and rich color can be paired with black, one of the most classic and timeless colors is gold. A black table with a saturated, gold table runner is a great example. Another is a black-painted wall with golden or brass sconces decorating it. Perhaps, between the sconces, is a painting with a gold or brass frame. This turns the black into a backdrop for contrast instead of a void.

Lighting Is Key

The biggest difference between a somewhat depressing cave of a home and a really classy, elegant home – both full of black – is lighting. If you fill your home with black, or extremely dark colors like blue or red, you need good lighting. A room that’s 90% black or black-adjacent with one little desk lamp is going to feel like a hole in the ground. 

Counteract this with:

  • Huge windows, ideally facing north or south to get light the entire day
  • Lots of light fixtures, especially where window light doesn’t reach
  • Additional lights where needed

Build a Luxury Home

If you’re looking to build a luxury home with a lot of dark colors, the experts on the matter are found at Heidan Construction. Let us know you’re not looking for a sterile, white home and we can certainly be of service.

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Hire Your Architects and Builders All at Once

Want to simplify the custom home building process? Save yourself from being a messenger between two different teams by hiring all from one place. Instead of hiring one team to design your home and one to build it, do both at once. Hire architects and builders through Heidan Construction’s design build option.

What Is Design Build?

Design build is a great option for people who want custom home building to be easier. This simple option simply means that your hired team does both designing and building. They’ll manage both ends of the custom home building process. That makes your job a lot easier. 

Does Design Build Work?

You might be wondering how design build works if the same team does both jobs. Do construction workers have the know-how to make a blueprint? Do architects have the skill and strength to physically put together a house? The answer may very well be yes to both questions. However, there’s more to it than that. 

Our team may not be made up of multitaskers, but it is made up of people who are working together every step of the way. Our designers, our architects, and our construction crew are constantly communicating with each other about client needs. Therefore, no part of the design goal is lost in translation. That means your home turns out exactly as you intended, and as we intended.

Luxury Custom Homes in Toronto

Custom homes are sometimes simply. However, they can also be incredibly luxurious. Heidan Construction specializes in luxury homes. So, if you want a little more in your home, we can make it happen.

What exactly comes with a luxury custom home? It varies depending on the needs of the client – that’s you! If you want smart home technology, we can incorporate that into your home however you want. That could mean clap-on lights, automated blinds, a smart fridge, or an intercom system. However, smart technology isn’t the only thing that comes with luxury. You could also opt for heated floors, towel warmers, a bidet toilet, and more. Luxury can mean so many things. Whatever it means to you, we can incorporate into your home design.

A Trail of Happy Clients

If you’re looking for the right design build team and just aren’t sure how to decide, the answer lies in the testimonials. Check out the reviews left by our past clients and see what they had to say. Seeing a trail of happy clients who have relied on our architects and builders in the past – both recent and distant – can reassure you that you’re making the right decision. Heidan Construction is the perfect choice for professional home design and home building and we look forward to working with you next.

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Choosing the Right Material for Your Custom Home

Having a custom home built means doing everything your way. However, that comes with a lot of choices. From the size of your bathroom to the type of floors you have, you get to choose as much as you want. So, have you considered one of the most important choices you can make? What will your home be made of? Choosing the right material for your custom home can be hard. So, let’s take a look at some of the pros and cons of each material.

Clay Bricks

Clay bricks are a really classic choice for homes built in North America. They go way back to the very early years of the US and Canada. After all, clay was so abundant, it made perfect sense to use it for all kinds of construction projects. And it made such beautiful, red bricks.

The great thing about clay bricks is that they’re hardy when built into a house. Even today, there are brick houses still standing that were built hundreds of years ago. This reliable material can stand the test of time, and look great while doing it.

Notably, clay bricks are fairly easy to replace. If one cracks or is damaged by external factors, it can be chipped out of its place and a new one can be slipped right back in.

On the less fortunate side of things, clay bricks can’t be insulated internally. Because they’re solid, the only way to insulate a single layer of bricks is to put up a wooden frame inside them. Then, you can put insulation and drywall over that frame. This is very effective. However, it does hide the bricks from the inside. If the appealing part of bricks is the way they look, both inside and outside, you may be able to do a double layer of bricks with insulation between them. However, this will be twice as expensive as one layer. Doing this for one focus wall may be something to consider, but not for the whole house.

Stone

Stone houses, such as those made from stone brick, come with much the same benefits and drawbacks as clay bricks. However, those made from rocks and mortar are a bit different. These types of walls are more prone to breaking over time, or getting water in them that then expands and causes cracks. If relying on stone, opt for bricks, or ensure your raw stone isn’t making up the bulk of your foundation.

Wood

Wood houses are exceedingly common in North America for a few reasons.

  1. They’re cheap to make. Wood is abundant in the US and Canada, so it’s much more affordable than something like stone, that must be dug up.
  2. Wood houses are easily insulated, as the walls are made up of wooden frame and then covered with other materials. Therefore, the walls are hollow. That makes them easy to fill with insulation.
  3. Wood is more flexible than stone, making it better at handling shifting ground and earthquakes, which are more common here than many other parts of the world.

Building Your Custom Home

No matter what material you opt for, if you’re looking to build a custom home, Heidan Construction is here to help. Give us a call if you’d like to set up a consult or have questions you’d like us to answer.

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Disability Accessible Luxury Custom Homes in Toronto

Disability often bars people from experiencing the things others take for granted each day. It’s not just theme parks and public events that cause problems for those with accessibility needs. Even something as fundamental as housing can be a real problem. But, it shouldn’t be! Buying a new home should mean getting a space that’s made for you, with all of your accessibility needs accounted for. And, you can’t get higher quality than disability accessible custom homes from Heidan Construction.

Wheelchair Accessible Kitchen

The average kitchen is absolutely not for someone with a wheelchair. The space is too narrow to easily maneuver a wheelchair in, the counters are too high, and so are the upper cabinets. Making a kitchen wheelchair accessible is a thoughtful task. You can’t just make the space more open for maneuverability; you have to look at everything through a new lens. Our team at Heidan Construction can do that to ensure our clients get exactly the space they need. That means a kitchen that’s both functional and enjoyable to use on a daily basis.

Mobility Sensitive Bathroom Design

There’s more to mobility accessibility than just wheelchairs. Some people use walkers or rollators. Others don’t use mobility aids in their house and would prefer a house that is the accommodation. For that reason, mobility sensitive bathroom design is a must have for any accessible custom homes.

Showers should have benches or enough space for a shower chair. Showers and tubs alike should have handrails to allow safe entering and exiting. Likewise, toilets should have a railing beside them to assist with transferring from another support or to assist with getting up again. No matter what kind of accessibility aid you need built into your bathroom, we can do it.

Accessible Exits

Something that is often taken for granted by abled people is their access to accessible emergency exits. How many different kinds of emergency exits can you think of right off the bat? Probably not many. Most of them involve climbing out of a window, using a ladder, or descending exterior stairs. Can you guess what group of people this won’t work for?

When designing your house to be accessible to all of your needs, that includes your safety needs. Adding additional exterior exits to your home, outfitted with ramps, can vastly improve your safety in the event of a fire or other emergency. We aim to keep you just as safe as any other homeowner, in ways that are often neglected during the home design process.

Comfortable Outdoor Spaces

Finally, with a nod to comfort, let’s discuss outdoor spaces – an area often ignored for people with disabilities. Comfortable outdoor spaces may include a patio, deck, or even a garden or pool. These spaces may need additional accommodations added to them, however. If you want to enjoy going outside but find yourself constantly prevented from enjoying your time out there due to society’s continual lack of accommodation, have a discussion with us and let us come up with some new ways to make your backyard a safe haven for you. We look forward to the challenge of personalizing your home exterior’s accessibility.

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Improve Mental Health with Color Psychology in Interior Design

Did you know the colors in your environment have a considerable impact on your state of mind? It’s true! Our brains hold associations for every color you can think of. What’s cool about that is that you can harness that associative power to trick your brain into doing what you need it to. Now let’s talk about a few ways you can use the power of color psychology in interior design.

Fight Depression

Have you ever found a specific room depressing to be in? What was it that made it feel that way? Were the walls painted blue or a color you dislike? Was the room messy or poorly lit? All of these things can impact the way you receive a room. Painting a room with a bright color that you like can be a great first step to preventing this. Of course, it also helps to ensure the lights are bright, the window is uncovered, and the room is clean – but those steps may be for another day.

The color blue has been found to encourage sadness and depression in many people. While this may not be universal, it is a pattern. On the other hand, colors like yellow, orange, and green have the opposite effect. Yellow and orange are bright, energizing colors. Green is a calm, natural color. Depending on what you’re after, any of these may be better alternatives .

Keep Motivated

Want to make getting to work in your home gym a bit easier? Paint the walls! Nothing is less motivating than going to work out in a white-walled home gym. White is such a boring, blank, unmotivating color. Instead, use the aforementioned yellow or orange to energize yourself!

In the wrong setting, orange – or even red – walls could cause anxiety or irritation. However, according to color psychology, these are the perfect color for ramping up energy in your brain and body alike. Something about the heat in these colors just screams, “Go! Go! Go! You can do this!!”

Remain Productive

Trying to keep your mind focused while working? You guessed it: there’s a color for that too. Keeping productive is easier to do with yellow or purple walls. Specifically, a lilac color would be ideal. This pinky purple color feels active, but calm, allowing you to hone in on your work with laser focus. However, if it’s not for you, a rich yellow might do the trick. Just be careful not to go to far in the orange direction, or your yellow might activate the anxious parts of your brain and leave you stressed and overthinking things.

Calm Your Nerves

Want your custom living room to provide you with relaxation in the evening? Or are you looking to calm down before bed? Color psychology say calming colors are the ones found most often in the natural world: green and brown. These colors feel cozy and earthy – like you’re one with nature. Our brains feel most at home with them, as they’re colors we can ignore. They don’t jump out at us like bright oranges or purples do. So, curl up under a blanket and let your gentle, brown walls soothe you to sleep.