David Hitchcock from Hamilton

After having a completely new bathroom installed on our second floor, it was time to prep and paint the ceiling of the kitchen below, which had been damanged by very intermittent leakage from the old bathroom fittings. Fred did a superb job of preparing the celing for painting, and of putting on primer and enough coats of paint. He made sure that everything was covered and drop sheets were on the floor, so that the mess after he was finished was minimal. After he did the ceiling, the walls looked very shabby, and he did them for the same price of $400 as he did the ceiling, with the same attention to quality of the preparation, complete covering by the paint, and lack of mess afterwards. Fred is a meticulous craftsman who does excellent work at a reasonable price.

Clayton is a superb specialist at working with traditional lath and plaster. He found and repaired all the cracks in the ceiling and walls of our 84-year-old home's living and dining room, and swirled the new plaster to match its surroundings. He is a meticulous perfectionist. He also installed drywall around thw wooden frame under a new skylight in our family room, fixed the cracks in the stuccoed drywall in the family room, and stuccoed both. Once the ceilings are painted, the new work will be indistinguishable from its surroundings--perfection. Clayton was very good at arriving when he said he would. Although he spent far more time than was envisaged in the original estimate, we were charged extra only for the repairs to the cornices (moulding) around our living room and dining room.

Westdale Renovations & Carpentry is Aaron Jongsma, a young man who has been working as an employed carpenter for many years and has just started (as of the summer of 2013) in business for himself. After seeing the beautiful job he did restoring the floors in his own home, we asked him to renovate one of our upstairs bedrooms, which was in sad shape. The job involved removing the old hardwood floor, making the floor a bit more level, installing a new hardwood floor, removing the damaged lath and plaster under the window, replacing it with insulation and drywall, replacing four doors in the upstairs hallway, prepping and repainting throughout, and many additional small tasks. We paid Aaron time ($35 an hour) and materials. About half the cost was for the materials (mainly the doors and the flooring). Aaron is a meticulous worker. The bedroom is now fit for a palace. He worked at a steady pace, neither rushing nor dawdling. He always let us know when he would be coming by next, and he always came when he said he would. He worked mostly with the door closed, so that we hardly knew he was in the house. He was extremely pleasant to work with, and gave very useful advice when asked. We are completely happy with the job he did, in all respects, and would not hesitate to ask him to do other renovation work when we need it.