Interior designer at Inara
Inara is a small estate, with room for all of you.
Few neighbours share the gardens, and a standard home has more floor than many terrace houses. We’ll give every part of it a purpose.
A round table with a lazy Susan and cabinets that close flush: the kind of dining room we’d plan between an Inara dry kitchen and the living hall.
- Developer
Bandar Raya Developments, now BRDB Developments
- Completed
2006, after going on sale in March 2004
- Homes
22 freehold homes, two to a floor or one duplex penthouse
- Sizes
About 3,400 sq ft on one level; duplex penthouses of about 5,300–6,000 sq ft
- Facilities
A swimming pool and a wading pool, an outdoor hot spa, a sauna, a gym and a multipurpose hall
Inara layouts and sizes, and what twenty years have worn
Inara is 22 homes by BRDB, finished in 2006: standard homes of about 3,400 sq ft on one floor, and six duplex penthouses.
We give every room a clear job and look after what twenty years have worn.
An estate this small has a particular hush: one gate, a handful of cars, neighbours you know by sight. The homes behind the doors are anything but small, and making that much space feel lived in is most of the work.
We’re Sundays in Bed, a Kuala Lumpur studio that designs and looks after homes. Our studio is a few minutes away, in Damansara Heights. We haven’t designed a home at Inara yet. The rooms we take on are yours to pick, and the fee for each is set down in writing first.
Inara stands on 1.13 acres at 15 Jalan Medang Serai, on Bukit Bandaraya. It was built by Bandar Raya Developments, who also built Serai along the same road.
Inara’s 22 freehold homes come in two built-up sizes:
- About 3,400 sq ft16 homes on one level; a recent sale listing describes four en-suite bedrooms, a helper’s room and two living halls
- About 5,300–6,000 sq ft6 two-storey penthouses, each with five bedrooms and a helper’s room
Age and wear
A standard Inara home has more floor than many terrace houses, all on one level. You’re unlikely to be short of room. What we’ll help you decide is what each room is for.
As a recent sale listing describes one, the standard plan was drawn for a household with a live-in helper and guests to entertain: two living halls, a show kitchen with a working one behind it, a helper’s room, and an open-air courtyard where the washing dries.
Some families still live that way. Others would like a den, a study, a proper laundry or a room for visiting grandparents, and we’ll plan for whichever is yours.
Long-held or newly bought, an Inara home shows its age in the same places. Bathrooms, waterproofing, wiring and the developer’s water filter and pump have all had twenty years of use, and they want putting right before the joinery goes in. We’ll look at them with you first.
Two homes to a landing, since 2004
BRDB put Inara on sale in March 2004, according to its annual report, and finished it in 2006. StarProperty describes each floor as holding only two standard homes, or a single duplex penthouse, so most owners share a landing with one neighbour at most.
That makes a renovation unusually personal. The household across the landing hears your drills before anyone else, so we give them the dates before work begins, and keep the noisiest trades to the mornings.
Interior design at Inara, starting with the rooms you really live in
At Inara, we begin with the rooms you really live in, then with what lies behind the walls, where twenty years of wear tend to hide.
If the family has two places to gather
Standard homes are listed with two separate living halls. One can stay formal for guests, and the other might become a family den, a TV room or a study. We give it a job first, and the furniture follows.
If your family eats at home every night
Inara’s homes were handed over with two kitchens, a dry one for show and a wet one for the real cooking. Keep the split if the cooking is serious: we spend on the dry kitchen everyone sees, and give the wet one ventilation and surfaces that take heat.
If you worry about leaks
Twenty-year-old bathrooms, balconies and indoor planters are where leaks start. Before choosing a single tile, we open up and check the waterproofing, the plumbing, and the whole-home water filter and pump the developer installed.
If your home still has its original pillars and feature walls
StarProperty lists antique-style pillars, feature walls and indoor garden features among the handover features. Some are worth keeping and lighting well, and others date a home. We’ll talk through each: keep, adapt or take out.
If your wardrobes and lights are still good
Built-in wardrobes and imported light fittings were listed among the original handover features. Where the carcasses are sound, we reface them with new doors, handles and interiors, which keeps good work in place and leaves more for the rooms that need it.
If the grandchildren come for the pool
Inara’s grounds hold a swimming pool and a wading pool, an outdoor hot spa, a sauna, a gym, a multipurpose hall, a viewing deck, a reading area, a playground and a barbecue area. When small visitors can spend the afternoon by the wading pool, the second living hall can be furnished for grown-ups, with a rug that forgives a spilt drink rather than a play mat.
If a 2006 smart-home panel is still on the wall
StarProperty lists a basic smart-home system among Inara’s original features, with an automatic water pump imported from Germany and the whole-home water filter. Home automation from 2006 rarely talks to today’s phones, and its panels can outlast their use. On the visit we find out what yours still controls, then decide with you whether to retire it neatly, reuse its wiring for new switches, or replace it with something simpler.
If your penthouse has gardens indoors
StarProperty’s list of original features includes indoor garden features ‘on both levels’, which points to the six duplex penthouses. A planter built into a slab twenty years ago is the first place we test for leaks. If it has done its job, we keep it and light it; if not, it becomes a dry display ledge, or comes out with the waterproofing below it redone.
What interior design costs at Inara
At Inara, the Sundays in Bed design fee for a standard 3,400 sq ft home is an estimated RM41,135–48,265, and for a duplex penthouse RM48,265–55,395.
It is a fee per room, agreed in writing before we begin.
- Each room we design
- RM3,565
- Living and dining
- RM5,485
Below is the design fee for an Inara home, standard or penthouse. Two living halls, as the standard plan is listed, are generous, and most households settle into one. So before we draw, we’d ask which hall you sit in on a weeknight. That one gets the design first; the formal hall can wait, or take on a new job.
If you’d like the second hall designed, it joins the fee as one more room; if it stays as it is, the fee doesn’t see it.
4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms and the dry and wet kitchens: 10 rooms at RM3,565, plus the open-plan living and dining at RM5,485. The foyer and utility yard are designed free.
Within each level, the lower figure covers the essentials; the upper figure adds extras such as a feature wall, LED strips and a kitchen island.
What the two levels mean
Curated. Melamine or laminate carpentry, quartz or sintered stone tops, the existing ceiling kept or a new plaster ceiling. Furniture from Commune, Cellini, Fella Design, Dezign District, Poet Living, Big Brain, Gudang, Crown Livin and Dadswood.
Bespoke. Detailed joinery, sintered stone tops, a plaster ceiling with detailing. Furniture from Space Furniture, Tekni, BoConcept, King Living, Ambient Living, Stanzo, Forest Furniture, Roche Bobois, XTRA, Urban Edge, Molteni&C, Nostaloft, Flexform, Janine and Chesters Collection.
How the fee works
We agree the total on paper before the first drawing, and you pay it in stages. Because it counts rooms rather than the contractors’ bill, stone in place of laminate on the dry kitchen leaves it untouched.
A standard four-bedroom home finished at Curated comes to about RM363k–642k with our fee.
Where the evenings happen. At Inara the design usually goes first to the bathrooms, the dry kitchen and the hall you actually sit in, and later to the formal one. Pick your home, then add the rooms worth designing. All figures are estimates until quotes arrive.
| Home | Our fee | Curated | Bespoke |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard 4+1 About 3,400 sq ft · one floor | RM41,135–48,265 | RM322k–594k | RM592k–1.21M |
| Duplex penthouse About 5,300–6,000 sq ft · two floors | RM48,265–55,395 | RM370k–715k | RM674k–1.44M |
The lower figure covers what most Inara households would hand us: the main hall, both kitchens, the bedrooms and the bathrooms counted below. The higher one adds two rooms, perhaps the second hall and the powder room.
These are October 2026 guides, not a quotation.
How these figures are worked out
Inara was completed in 2006, so we’ve priced it as a lived-in resale home. Of the four en-suites and the powder room in a standard home we count four, and five in a penthouse, leaving out the helper’s; switch on only the bathrooms you’d really change.
New kitchen cabinets, wardrobes, air-conditioners and appliances are all priced in. Inara’s homes came with built-in wardrobes and an equipped dry and wet kitchen; where yours are sound, they can stay and drop out of the estimate.
Furnishing to let?
If your Inara home is going to tenants, our Essential level, furnished from Ikea, SSF Home and Harvey Norman, is the practical choice: faster to complete and straightforward to look after. Each room’s design fee stays the same whatever the level.
Renovation and furniture at Essential, before our fee
- Standard 4+1
- RM183k–308k
- Duplex penthouse
- RM212k–371k
Begin with a conversation
Tell us who lives with you, which hall you use and what has changed since 2006. Expect a fee estimate for your rooms by the end of the first call.
Or begin with a figure
Answer a few questions about your space, and you’ll have an estimate to consider in your own time.
An Inara interior designer for living in it, letting it or deciding
At Inara, we plan the order of work around how you use the home: lived in, newly bought or let.
Contractors you choose do the building, from quotes we compare with you line by line.
One builder, two names, and a concierge at the door
Inara’s builder was listed for decades as Bandar Raya Developments Bhd, the company that developed Bukit Bandaraya itself in the 1970s. It was taken private in 2012 and now trades as BRDB Developments Sdn Bhd, so your sale papers and the building’s drawings may carry either name. In December 2012 it launched Serai along the same road, on what The Edge called the last prime plot on the hill.
If a wall’s purpose is ever unclear, we ask the management for the original drawings under both names. And as StarProperty lists concierge services here, we tell the front desk which contractor is due, and when, before each works day.
- The discovery call FreeStandard home or penthouse, who lives there now or will soon, what was changed since 2006, and the amount you’d like to spend.
- The site visit RM200, waived if you go ahead with usWe measure both halls and every bedroom, look for damp in the bathrooms and planters, check the water filter and pump, and note what is worth keeping.
- The scope, then the designThe rooms, the overall spend and our fee go into writing. Then each room is drawn, and the second hall and the helper’s room are given their new jobs.
- Drawings and quotesContractors price one set of drawings. We lay their quotes side by side, show you where they differ and why, and the builder is yours to choose.
- On site, then moving inWaterproofing and wiring are done and checked before a single finish goes on. Then the joinery, then the furniture, and the rooms are dressed last.
A twenty-year-old home hides surprises behind its tiles, and twenty-one neighbours will notice the noise. We’ll sequence the work, the trades and the approvals, so living through it is easier for you. The full process
Permission to renovate
Work at Inara needs two yeses before anyone starts: a DBKL permit, which your contractor obtains, and the management’s agreement in writing.
Inara doesn’t publish its renovation terms, so we ask the management for the deposit, the working hours and how materials may come up, and build those into the programme before any contractor quotes.
Renovating an Inara home so it needn’t look its age
An Inara home can wear its years lightly.
The bones are generous, with big rooms and a proper pair of kitchens, and what dates a home here is usually its surfaces and fittings, the easiest part to change.
Maybe your children have left home, or maybe a family of five and a helper share your house. The same Inara plan can suit either very differently. So we ask about your weeks first: whose cooking fills the wet kitchen, whose desk needs a door, who arrives with a suitcase.
What to keep and what to renew at Inara
- KeepThe layout, the kitchen pairTwo halls, four en-suites and a dry and wet kitchen are worth keeping as they are
- AdaptWardrobes, pillars, feature wallsReface sound built-ins; keep or retire the developer’s decorative details one by one
- RenewBathrooms, wiring, waterproofingTwenty years of use behind the tiles and inside the walls
- CheckWater filter, pump, plantersThe whole-home system and indoor gardens from the handover, before anything is closed up
Drawn from the developer’s handover features as published by StarProperty and current sale listings. Your own home may have been changed since, so we confirm everything on the visit.
What renovating homes near Inara has cost
Bangsar’s published renovation records don’t yet include an Inara home. The nearest is along the same road: a four-bedroom Serai home of 3,300 sq ft, which came to RM650,000, about RM197 a square foot, across fifteen weeks of works. BRDB lists Serai’s homes from 4,025 sq ft, so the record may cover part of a home.
Our nearest own work is a home we designed at Bangsar Hill Park, a short drive away.
Other studios have put nine Bangsar fit-outs on record with an area and a total side by side, and the one in the middle came to RM114 a square foot. At that rate, a 3,400 sq ft standard Inara home would come to about RM388,000 of works.
Both figures, and every other building, are on the Bangsar renovation cost page.
FAQ
Your Inara home, room by room
Our Inara home dates from 2006. What usually needs redoing first?
The parts you can’t see. Bathroom waterproofing, older plumbing and wiring, and the developer’s water filter and pump usually come first. We check them on the site visit, so the design starts with what is worn before anything that only looks dated.
StarProperty describes the original pump as an automatic one imported from Germany, and lists a basic smart-home system too. Twenty years on, both deserve a specialist’s look even if they still run, before new joinery closes off the way to them.
What can we do with the second living hall?
Give it the job your household is missing. Many families make it a den with the television and keep the other hall for guests; others prefer a study or a play room. Either way, its lighting and storage follow from that choice.
Should we keep both the wet and the dry kitchen?
Usually, yes. Where the cooking is fierce, the wet kitchen keeps the smoke and smell away from the halls, and the dry kitchen can become a calm place for breakfast and coffee. If you rarely cook, the wet kitchen could become a bigger laundry or a pantry.
Roughly what would a standard Inara home cost to renovate and furnish?
For a standard home of about 3,400 sq ft, renovation and furniture run roughly RM322k–594k at Curated and RM592k–1.21M at Bespoke, before our fee. Sound built-ins that you keep come off those figures.
We own a duplex penthouse. What is different?
Two floors and a staircase. Some penthouses also have a rooftop terrace and an upper family area; where yours does, the terrace waterproofing and the stair are the bigger jobs, and the upstairs family area makes a quieter second living room. We confirm your layout on the visit.
Do we need approval to renovate at Inara?
Yes, from two sides: DBKL, by way of a permit your contractor obtains, and Inara’s own management, in writing. The deposit, hours and rules for bringing materials up aren’t published, so we confirm them before contractors quote.
Lorries reach the gate from Jalan Maarof by Jalan Medang Kapas, so we also agree with management where a delivery may stand while it unloads.
When was Inara built, and who developed it?
Inara was finished in 2006 by Bandar Raya Developments, which put it on sale in March 2004. The company was taken private in 2012 and now trades as BRDB Developments Sdn Bhd, so your sale papers and the building’s drawings may carry either name.
What are the floor plans at Inara?
Inara has two layouts: 16 standard homes of about 3,400 sq ft on one level, and six two-storey penthouses of about 5,300–6,000 sq ft, each with five bedrooms and a helper’s room. A recent sale listing describes the standard plan with four en-suite bedrooms, two living halls, a show kitchen with a working one behind it, a helper’s room and an open-air courtyard where the washing dries.
What facilities does Inara have?
Inara’s grounds hold a swimming pool and a wading pool, an outdoor hot spa, a sauna, a gym, a multipurpose hall, a viewing deck, a reading area, a playground and a barbecue area. StarProperty also lists concierge services, and the estate sits on 1.13 acres at 15 Jalan Medang Serai, on Bukit Bandaraya.
Can I see photos of an Inara home you’ve designed?
Not yet: we haven’t designed a home at Inara. Our nearest own work is a home we designed at Bangsar Hill Park, a short drive away.
What interior design services do you offer at Inara?
Inara has just 22 homes in three six-storey blocks, and our condo interior design for its four-bedroom homes and duplex penthouses of 3,400 to 5,500 sq ft includes renovation design. We draw the plans, compare contractors’ quotes with you and manage the works on site, and contractors do the building. Styling on its own, furnishing through our Procurement Concierge, and Virtual Design for homes beyond Kuala Lumpur and Selangor are also part of what we do.
Interior design Interior styling Condo interior design Virtual Design
What have twenty years changed in your home? We’d like to hear.
Standard home or penthouse, long-held or freshly bought: tell us which, what’s been altered since 2006 and a figure you have in mind. We’ll talk it over at no charge, and our design fee reaches you in writing before you decide.
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