Hallway renovation in Batumi: floor, wardrobe, consumer unit and lighting

What to decide before any strip-out

We start a hallway renovation in Batumi with a plan of the furniture by the entrance. The wardrobe, shoe cabinet and mirror decide where the sockets and switches go, whether the front door has room to open fully, and whether the consumer unit stays within reach. If the wardrobe is only drawn after plastering, a socket ends up behind its side panel and the consumer unit behind its shelves.

At the site measurement the foreman measures the hallway to the future finished walls and checks how the front door and interior doors open. We also mark where the developer has brought in the internet provider's cable and the intercom. In white frame the consumer unit often hangs right by the door, on the very wall you would like to give to the wardrobe. We settle this straight away, before the first-fix electrics, because moving the consumer unit drags every circuit in the apartment along with it.

The floor by the entrance: porcelain tiles and a heating mat

Shoes carry rainwater into the hallway, and in summer sand and small pebbles from the beach. Sand scratches a floor like sandpaper, and water seeps into the click joints of boards. So by the door we lay porcelain tiles with a matt or textured surface, and prepare the base for 60×60 or 60×120 tiles as described on the page about laying porcelain floor tiles. If the rooms have laminate or wood flooring, we bring the two floors to the same height at the screed stage, so that there is no step where they meet.

Under the tiles by the entrance it is worth laying an electric underfloor heating mat on its own thermostat. In winter it dries out wet shoes and the doormat, and the tiles by the door stop feeling icy. We lay the mat only on open floor: under a wardrobe or shoe cabinet it overheats and warms the furniture instead of your feet.

The front door: when to fit it and which way it opens

If the developer's door is being replaced, the new one goes in after the rough work, once the screed is done and the finished floor level is known. The threshold is set to that level, and the reveals are finished together with the hallway walls. Which door to choose for an apartment by the sea and how we fit it is covered on the page about front doors.

For the hallway layout something else matters more: where the door swings when it is open. If it opens into the apartment, the leaf must not hit the wardrobe, mirror or bench, so we draw its opening arc on the furniture plan. The switch goes on the handle side, not behind the open leaf. Between the handle and the end of the wardrobe we leave a gap or fit a door stop, otherwise within a year the handle will dent the side panel.

Wardrobe, shoes and wet things

A wet jacket and umbrella don't go into a closed wardrobe. Overnight the humidity inside rises, and in an empty apartment in winter the shoes on the shelf go mouldy. So we split hallway storage into two zones. The open one has hooks, an umbrella stand with a drip tray and a slatted shelf for wet shoes. The closed one is a floor-to-ceiling wardrobe for seasonal clothes, the vacuum cleaner and suitcases.

In the plinth and the top of the closed wardrobe doors we put ventilation grilles, so that air passes through the shelves. The carcass, doors and interior fittings are designed by the furniture maker, and how we make made-to-measure wardrobes and hallway units is covered separately. What the wardrobe needs from the renovation is square corners, plumb walls and a level floor. If things are a centimetre out, the doors will hang with uneven gaps, and adjusting the hinges won't put that right.

Consumer unit, router and intercom

The apartment's consumer unit in the hallway must open fully, and in front of it there has to be room for an electrician to stand with tools. So on the furniture plan we draw the consumer unit first, and the wardrobe goes around it, not the other way round. Which wall it is best placed on, how many modules it needs and how we divide the circuits into groups is described on the page about apartment consumer unit assembly.

The internet provider's cable usually comes into the apartment by the door. If the router needs to be in the middle of the apartment, we run a network cable there from the entry point before plastering. A video intercom needs its own outlet at eye level and a power supply, and we mark its position on the plan together with the switches.

Mirror and lighting by the entrance

We hang a full-length mirror with its bottom edge about 30–40 cm off the floor and its top edge at 190–200 cm. You can see yourself in it shoes and all, and it suits a tall adult and a child equally well. The wall behind it must be flat and dry, so the mirror goes up after painting. If the mirror covers the whole wall, we order it from measurements taken off the finished wall, not from the drawing.

The light at the mirror should come from the front or the sides. A downlight directly overhead casts a shadow on your face, and you look worse than you are. Over the passage we fit downlights, and the light by the entrance is handy on a motion sensor: with bags in your hands you don't hunt for the switch, and a guest in a rental apartment won't leave it on all day. If the hallway leads into a long passage to the bedrooms, we plan the lighting and doors together with it, as on the page about corridor renovation in an apartment.

How much a hallway renovation costs in Batumi

A hallway renovation costs from 620 to 900 ₾ per m² of floor. This price covers labour and rough-work materials: strip-out, electrics, levelling the walls and reveals, correcting the screed, laying the floor, the ceiling and painting. Porcelain tiles, the front door and the furniture are priced separately, according to the models you choose.

A square metre of hallway costs more than a square metre of bedroom. A small area carries a lot of work: the front door reveals, the consumer unit, short walls with corners and several doorways. Of the separate estimate lines, the most common are laying 60×60–60×120 porcelain tiles, from 75 to 96 ₾ per m² for labour only, and made-to-measure hallway furniture with a wardrobe, coat rack and shoe cabinet, from 1,140 to 1,800 ₾ per set, installed. The front door is priced by the chosen model and the size of the opening.

A hallway in white frame, where the developer's consumer unit and outlets are already in the right places, comes out closer to the lower end. Moving the consumer unit, a new door with reveals and a wall-to-wall mirror push the estimate up. The final cost is set after the site measurement and once the estimate is agreed, and the price of each stage is written into the contract.

What to check when you accept the hallway

• we tap the tiles at the threshold: a void under a tile will crack first, and this spot is walked on every day;
• the front door opens all the way without touching the wardrobe, mirror or switch, and the threshold doesn't catch the tiles;
• the consumer unit door opens fully, the breakers are labelled, and the circuit diagram is in the handover file;
• the light switches on from the door, and the sockets by the shoe cabinet and mirror work under load;
• there is no step where the porcelain tiles meet the laminate or wood;
• the wardrobe grilles are not blocked by shelves, and the doors hang with even gaps.