Fifth Element Design

My husband and I hired Fifth Element Design to help us with the renovation of our entire first floor and 3 bathrooms this year. The renovation started in February of 2021 as we were responsible for the demolition. We hired Fifth Element Design to take care of the following: stairs, bathrooms, drywall, taping and interior doors. We were advised the job with take 3 month for and end of June completion.

The job started end of March with removal of a load bearing wall and installation of an LVL beam which was installed successfully. Our feature ceiling in the family room was built by the contractor’s husband which was done beautifully. As the renovation was being done during COVID 19 we expected there would be delays and one of our first was the availability of drywall. In an effort to assist we reached out to someone we knew and drywall was delivered.. Once the framing was done and drywall went up things started to go downhill and looking back that would have been the proper time to end our relationship with FED. Their lack of prep work ie: proper caulking not limited to using incorrect/cheap material to caulk resulted in cracking in the coffered ceiling which our Contractor blamed Benjamin Moore paint. We called BM rep who came out and their findings concluded that a combination of poor prep and inexpensive caulking resulted in the cracks to the coffered ceiling. While painting the rest of the house their paint vendor painted everything including parts of our new floor flooring, new cabinets and new porcelain tile floor as prepping to ensure these spaces were protected was not taken into consideration. We raised these issues with our contractors and reminded them that taking another job to start in mid July was negatively impacting completion of our Reno and most importantly their quality of work which they did not seem to phase them. They continued to provide assurances that our job was their priority however their actions did not reflect that. As an example in a rush to get to their next job in July (note original end of job was not met) and our job at 75% completion, they blasted through prep for painting, which caused problems with the paint job revealing poor quality of taping and sanding and cracks in coffered ceiling. After several discussions, we understood that our job would be rushed with multiple mistakes ie- improper hanging of barn doors, all interior doors were hung incorrectly, our master bedroom door would not close as the barn door that was hung for the closet was not at the correct height. As a result of all the above we made the easy decision to let FED go and take on the completion of the renovation on our own. Our first step was to hire a proper finish carpenter to correct all of the mistakes which included adjustments to the framing, purchase of new barn door to replace the one we had just bought and numerous other items at an additional well spent cost of $2100.
The most frustrating thing about this contractor is how disingenuous they are, as they do not listen to your needs, the phrase “it’s your house not mine” basically translates to I really don’t care what the customer says. They cut corners where they can and if they are unsure how to complete a task it stays unattended for weeks or it is left as is, in the hope the client will become frustrated and just settle. We were asked to outline our needs and wants which we did with the understanding that they would get us pricing however that never materialized and we soon came to understand their interpretation of needs and wants meant you outline what you need and we will decide if we “want” to do it. As a example we requested a charger drawer for cell phones along with a data cable and after 4 visits by an electrician and several discussions we have a data cable to nowhere and a standard outlet with no USB connections. They reward their vendors for substandard work or just not done ie: paint which was poorly done as we mentioned above. We are slowly getting our house in order our way and the right way, nearing the end of what was to be a 3 month reno to end in 8 months.