A comprehensive electrical upgrade across a main house and annexed living space in Bodmin - covering kitchen rewiring, lighting installations, socket additions, driveway lighting and much more. Wave Electrical Solutions delivered the full scope over several days, working carefully throughout an occupied and actively renovating property.
When a homeowner in Bodmin decided to push ahead with a substantial renovation across both their main house and an annexed living area, the electrical side of things needed just as much attention as anything else on the project. It wasn’t a simple one-room job – this was a multi-day, multi-room undertaking that required careful planning, a fair bit of chasing into masonry, and a good understanding of how the existing circuits were laid out before we could get started.
The kitchen was arguably where the most involved work took place. The client was having a false chimney breast installed as part of a wider kitchen redesign, and that meant the existing countertop sockets in the corner needed relocating to accommodate it. We re-sited those outlets and also added a further countertop socket at the opposite end of the kitchen, near the windows, giving a much more practical spread of power across the worktop. While we were in there, we also installed three downlights inside the false chimney itself, wired to run independently from the rest of the kitchen lighting – so the client has full control over the ambience without affecting the main overhead circuit.
The island lighting was another consideration. Three pendant lights above the kitchen island were supplied with new electrical feeds, again on a separate circuit from the main downlights. Having distinct switching zones throughout the kitchen makes a real difference day to day – you’re not stuck putting on every light just to make a cup of tea at night. The existing hob and cooker hood supplies were also disconnected and removed, with the old cabling taken back as far as reasonably possible to leave things clean and tidy for the next phase of the kitchen fit-out. An immersion heater that had been pre-wired was connected in as part of the same visit.
Moving through to the annex, there was a decent amount of work to get through there too. The living room gained three additional double socket outlets – two positioned near the TV wall and one closer to the kitchen area – all recessed neatly into the masonry walls rather than left on the surface. The supply for those was extended from the bedroom circuit above. Two client-supplied wall lights were also fitted in the annex living room, with the existing single light switch swapped out for a two-gang unit so both the original lighting and the new wall lights can be controlled separately. All cabling for the lights was chased into the masonry to keep the finish as clean as possible.
In the annex kitchen, the existing pendant fitting was swapped for a client-supplied replacement – a straightforward change on paper, but one that makes a noticeable difference to the look and feel of the space. Over in the annex bedroom, the brief was almost the opposite – three existing wall lights and their associated cabling were removed, taken back as far as was practicable. The switch was also changed to a single-gang unit to reflect the simplified setup.
Back in the main house, the bathroom and adjacent storage area got some attention too. The existing electric towel rail in the main bathroom was disconnected and removed, and the spur that had been feeding it – located in a nearby cupboard – was converted into a double socket outlet, making that storage space a fair bit more useful in the process.
The hallway cable was another job on the list. There was an existing surface-run cable feeding a games room socket that wasn’t ideal where it was, so we re-routed it into the floorboards and chased it into the masonry where needed. An extra socket was also added to the left of the chimney breast in the bedroom, taken from that same circuit. It’s the kind of tidy-up work that doesn’t always photograph brilliantly but makes a big difference to how a room looks and functions once it’s finished.
For the main living room, socket outlets were added at mid-wall height for a media wall installation, with the circuit extended through the floor void above. That involved lifting a section of bathroom lino on the floor above to get access, though everything was re-laid once the cabling was run through.
Outside, we also installed electrical supplies for six post lantern lights along the driveway and a short lantern on the gate pillar – all client-supplied units. The power was drawn from the garage consumer unit, with groundworks handled separately by others. The lighting is controlled via a combined daylight sensor and timer unit, so the whole driveway illuminates automatically at dusk and shuts off at whatever time suits the household.
Throughout the project, wherever cabling needed to go into masonry walls, we used dustless extraction chasing tools to keep the mess to a minimum. Channels were filled back with bonding coat plaster once cables were in, ready for the decorator to fine fill and finish. Any sub-floor access points were patched and any lifted carpets were re-laid before we left.
It was a genuinely varied project and one that needed a methodical approach to work through efficiently – particularly with different trades working on the property at the same time. The end result is a home with a significantly improved electrical layout throughout, both inside and out, that’ll serve the client well for years to come.
