Bonnie Hindmarsh - Three Birds Renovations: Dream Home How-To

Best friends for almost 20 years, Lana, Erin and Bonnie have seen each other through all the ups and downs of life: meeting and marrying their husbands, starting families (they have nine beautiful children between them) and juggling busy careers. But in 2014, they took a leap of faith together, quit their jobs and created Three Birds Renovations in pursuit of a more fulfilling life working for themselves, doing something they loved and with more family time. Within a few short months of starting out they had successfully bought, renovated and sold their first property.

Fast-forward to today and the trio have transformed 14 houses, learned more than they ever could have imagined and poured all that hard-earned knowledge into their online courses, The Reno School and Three Birds Styling School. Tens of thousands of students are now designing and styling their homes using the Birds words of wisdom. Their energy, passion and vision have swept across Instagram and YouTube, turning the busy mums into social media sensations. Their videos are now watched in over 110 countries and each new project graces the pages of Australias leading home magazine titles.

Lana, Erin and Bonnies first book, Three Birds Renovations , was shortlisted for a 2019 Australian Book Industry Award and is the countrys bestselling home improvement title. This is their second book.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

WERE BACK, BABY!

If youre thinking, Theres no way these three have come up with enough new tips to fill another book , spoiler alert: we totally have! This book is packed to the faux rafters with hundreds of shiny new tips, DIY hacks galore and more design inspo than you can poke a palm frond at.

In fact, weve learned SO much more since completing Bons home (which is where our last book left off). Weve reworked more floor plans, knocked down more walls, prettied up more pergolas basically, weve been doing all of the reno-y things the three of us love doing, and getting them done on schedule and within budget (shout-out to Ez for that). Each new project presents unique challenges, but thats exactly why we keep renovating: if the learnings keep coming, we keep sharing them.

We love mixing up our projects to keep things fresh, so alongside our whole home transformations weve also got an office revamp and two big, new builds for you. But as much as we love the thrill of building a new house from the ground up, the heart and soul of Three Birds Renovations remains renovating the much-loved suburban family home. We share some amazing transformations in this book, and its hard to pick a favourite as we love them all.

To keep the reno magic rolling, weve needed lots of support, so weve welcomed many new birdies into our growing Three Birds nest, including a CEO, Candice (#bigbird). We are blown away that this business of ours this idea shared between three best friends in a caf years ago has grown into the company it has. Defying the odds, our business and our friendship continue to thrive, and both are doing better than ever. #bffs #workwives

Chapter 6 is dedicated to our nest Three Birds HQ. Its where all of our birdies flock together, so it was a very special project. More than anything, we wanted our office to feel like a home away from home. And then, in a case of life imitating art, COVID hit, and the world found itself working from home anyway. Nowadays, you need only style the snippet you can see in the background of your Zoom screen! #ministylingmoment

For years, weve been preaching that how you FEEL in your home is the single most important thing, and now that were all spending so much time at home, this message is more relevant than ever. This is why every project we do from a bedroom makeover to a whole home reno starts with the same question: how do we want to feel in this space? Once we know the answer, we find inspo pics and images of homes, spaces and places that match the feeling were going for, and we use them to build a vision board. A vision board becomes your guiding light, your true north, and you will be able to refer back to it for EVERY design decision you make.

Every single project in this book had a rock-solid vision board. Theres a whole chapter on Christmas, showcasing our favourite moments from recent Christmases, and you can bet your baked ham we had a vision board for every one of those themes. Without this, you wont get a gorgeous, cohesive look that stirs the emotions and puts a smile on your face.