April

Despite being higher priced, we hired invision to install our floors and refinish our stairs due to their strong assurance that they could execute the job we wanted. The floors were beautifully done and met our expectations. The stairs however were a disaster. Having run into issues in our basement with someone who could not successfully execute a 2-tone stain, I had specifically asked about this before choosing them to complete the job and was reassured by Dove that they could do this. This was not the case however. They had to strip the stairs and start over numerous times due to a variety of errors in execution, including dripping stain, using tape that pulled the stain off, and not giving coats long enough dry time. 2-tone staining was clearly out of their comfort zone. Although the delays were frustrating, we were quite patient about all of the process errors as long as the job was completed successfully. Dove was not as patient however about all of the extra time the job was taking to correct and made us feel like we should just accept the errors and should not expect them to fix the work until it was completed successfully. After much uncomfortable discussion back and forth, the work was completed to most of our satisfaction. It’s just too bad that Dove’s attitude about the whole thing was so poor.

We hired Art Metal Workshop several years ago to chomp design and install our front entrance railings and our back porch glass railings. Over the past 12 years I have done numerous jobs and renovations to my home. I think Art Metal Workshop is probably the only company we have ever dealt with where everything was done on schedule, everything went as planned, and everything was done to our satisfaction. They aren’t super cheap but the workmanship and customer service were well worth the price. I always recommend them to anyone I know that is looking to do their railings.

We called Mehdi to do a very small job in our entrance way. We recently had the rest of the floors in the house done and immediately regretted not doing the entrance too. The company was not able to return promptly to complete the entrance so we called Mehdi to do the job. He came very quickly and gave us a decent quote. He said it would be done in a day. He came to do the work himself, along with another worker. Unfortunately, both men seemed to lack the skill or expertise to properly execute the job. During demo they damaged our nosing, which had just been done, so we had to pay for new nosing to be put in. The job dragged on over a week due to the lack of expertise and in the end Mehdi left the job incomplete. I don’t think either of us had faith in his ability to complete it properly at this point. I then had to run around looking for products and then complete the job myself. Although he seemed like a nice guy, I just don’t think he or his worker really knew what they were doing. This simple job seemed to be way over their heads. There is also a spot in my entrance now where one plank has dropped and is no longer level.