The messy middle: Building Altura, part two
Overview
Part one of this story was about a dream-twenty years in the making, finally coming out of the ground. Part two is about everything that happens after the dream becomes a construction site. Because that’s the part nobody really shows you. Not the reveal, not the render, the actual middle. The stretch where the weather doesn’t cooperate, the site fights back a little, and you just keep showing up anyway. It’s the same stretch every client goes through on their own build, and we’re living it right alongside our own. So that’s where we’re picking up.
What’s happening on site right now
A few big-ticket items have landed since we last checked in.
The roof is on. The windows are in. Wrapping’s done. Which means we can finally move forward into external and internal linings, the point where a house properly starts to feel like a house.
Our on-site carpenters have also finished the structural staircase, and there’s a curved feature wall taking shape in the media room that we’re genuinely excited about – it’s one of those details that looks like “just framing” right now, but once it’s plastered, it’s going to look incredible.
And if you caught our latest episode, you’ll have seen the first proper feature come together: the arch door from Hardware Concepts at Burleigh. It’s exactly what we pictured; one small piece of the vision, standing there in real life instead of on a render. There’s something about the first feature landing on site that makes the whole thing feel real again, in a way even the approvals and the slab didn’t quite manage.
Why “Altura” still makes sense, standing here
We loved the idea of being up high…
We named this place for the estate it sits in — Altitude — and the elevated block we bought within it. We loved the idea of being up high, catching the southerly breezes and the outlook that comes with them. It’s the kind of thing you fall for on paper, before you’ve actually stood there. Sitting here now, mid-build, we can genuinely feel it: the breeze moving straight through the house, even with half the walls still open. Turns out the name wasn’t just a nice idea after all — it’s exactly what this block does.
How the two of us actually became a team
Billy’s been in the building industry since he was 15…
We get asked a lot how Livin’ came to be “us” — not just a builder and someone who handles the pretty bits, but genuinely two people building a business together. So here’s the honest version.
Billy’s been in the building industry since he was 15 — straight out of school in year 10, into an apprenticeship. His old man and his grandfather were both builders, and following in their footsteps was never really a question. Some of his earliest memories are of going to work with them, and that’s really where the love of it started.
Kylie and Billy joining forces professionally, though, came later — and it took a caravan. After COVID, we packed up the kids and did a lap of Australia, just shy of twelve months on the road. That trip gave us the space to actually stop and ask what we wanted — for us, and for the business — instead of just carrying on the way things had always been.
Billy had already been a builder and a chippy for years. Kylie had spent years as a wedding and portrait photographer, plus a marketing and content creation background, with an eye for interior design she’d picked up along the way renovating their own homes together. Put side by side, it was obvious: Billy could build it properly, and Kylie could help people see it before it existed and tell the story once it did. So we figured — why not put it all together and go all in? That trip is really where Livin’ as we know it now began. Two decades of separate skills, finally pointed in the same direction.
Are we back on track? Honestly, yes – but it wasn’t a straight line
We had a few hiccups early on.
The weather down here did what it does, and building on a sloping site brings its own complications — getting materials and trades down the hill isn’t as simple as it sounds, and it’s the kind of thing that eats a schedule quietly, week by week, rather than all at once. But we’ve had a genuinely decent run of weather this past month, and it’s helped us really kick things into gear and start making up that ground.
Pro tip: building on a sloping block? Factor site access for materials and trades into your program early — it’s often the bigger timeline risk, more than the weather itself.
What are we up to now
Right now Altura still looks like a building site wrapped in scaffolding from the road.
Plasterboard’s going up throughout the house. External cladding starts, which means we’re getting properly sealed and weatherproof – no more waiting on the weather to move certain trades along. And honestly, the thing we’re both most looking forward to is the scaffold coming down. Right now Altura still looks like a building site wrapped in scaffolding from the road. Once that comes off, we finally get to stand back and actually see the shape of the house we’ve been picturing for twenty years.
Follow the Altura journey
This is only part two. There’s a lot of house left between here and the finished version we’ve had in our heads all along — but the middle is where the real work happens, and we didn’t want to skip past it. It’s the same middle every one of our clients goes through, and it helps to know it’s normal.
Love, Kylie & Billy