Savvy Couple Quoted £3230 For Light-Up Feature Wall Build It Themselves For £270
- Sujitha Uppalapati, 29, spotted a light up feature wall on Pinterest
- When she was quoted £3,230 by builders, she decided to build it herself
- Her feature wall is stunning and cost her just £270
Many of us who are obsessed with home decor pages on Instagram and Pinterest have fallen in love with a look or an idea that seems impossibly expensive to recreate at home.
But one savvy couple, after seeing an amazing feature wall on Pinterest, brought the look home for a fraction of the cost.
Sujitha Uppalapati, 29, and her husband Siddhartha, 29, who are both software developers in Austin, Texas, were quoted $4,200 (£3,230) to create a stunning light-up feature wall.
Instead, the couple managed to build it themselves on a budget of just $350 (£270).
Sujitha told money-saving community LatestDeals.co.uk: "Both of us are travel lovers and due to the current quarantine situation, our plans for the year are stalled.
“So we decided to hammer our time into one of our other passions which is DIY. We have done some other DIY work since the whole pandemic situation started too.
"But this time, we wanted to take it a step further.
"Pinterest is one of the most used apps on my phone and one day when I was scrolling through, I came across a blog on a grey themed apartment in Ukraine.
"I noticed a wall with some lights in the background of one of the pictures, and it immediately caught my attention. I liked it a lot and thought would be so cool to have in our home.
"I saved a picture of it and reached out to local businesses who do feature walls to get a quote.
"While most of them never got back to me, one business did, and they asked for $4,200 (£3,230) including materials and labour.
"We were not sure if we wanted to put such a whopping amount of money on a feature wall, however, we still wanted to have it.
"One weekend, we sat down and brainstormed to see if we would be able to make it ourselves.
"We drew a layout, came up with an implementation plan, listed down the materials required and did some cost calculations.
"At first glance, it seemed not too bad and I convinced my husband into trying it out ourselves.
“We chose the wall in our breakfast nook because it’s more visible.
“We started off with buying wood and cutting them into the sizes we outlined in the layout.
"We then sanded all the wood, drilled holes to host the LED bulbs and did some electrical wiring work.
"The challenging part was mounting everything onto the wall and finishing up all the wiring stuff.
"Once all that was done, we painted the wood in two colours: charcoal grey and a wood colour.
"We connected the wire to a nearby outlet using a smart switch, so that we can operate it with our phone or ask Alexa to do it for us.”
Sujitha is delighted with her lockdown project, which ended up costing her less than $350 (£270) as opposed to the thousands she had been quoted.
"The result is so rewarding, and we have got lot of compliments from everyone,” she adds.
"We really feel proud of ourselves whenever we look at it. This whole project cost us less than $350 (£270) but definitely looks worth much more.
"My tips to anyone who would like to try something similar is firstly don’t be scared to try out something yourselves, but always have a backup plan if things go south.
"If you are not comfortable with electrical wirings, be in touch with someone who is good with it.
"We personally loved making it as it helped us to be engaged during weekends for a while.
"We never got bored or complained about being at home during this quarantine phase because of these DIY projects.
"For anyone who would like to see how we did this and other DIY projects in detail, my YouTube channel is Suji’s DIY corner!”
Tom Church, co-founder of LatestDeals.co.uk, comments: “While it’s always tempting to leave complicated projects to professionals such as builders or interior designers, the savings when you take on home improvements yourself can be dramatic.
“In the case of Sujitha and Siddhartha, they’ve saved thousands and thousands of pounds, and their feature wall looks incredibly slick and professional - I’d love one exactly the same in my own home!"
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