Featured Blog Posts (86)

This is a clip from an 1875 "birds eye" map showing my house.  

According to a local historian, the town summoned artists to prepare such a map by lifting them in a hot-air balloon, from which they would prepare drawings of the neighborhood one block at a time.  The original of this particular map,…

I mentioned in a previous blog that I had ordered new, unfinished kitchen cabinets for my house. It was the only way I could afford to replace the existing cabinets, which were old and filthy. I would have had to do some major work to get them clean enough to even use, and they were built in place at some point after the house was built, I believe. The back…

So the real estate record indicated my house was built in 1880, as I mentioned in my previous entry...  and I found evidence that the house already existed in 1875, since a local map surveyed that year clearly shows my house at that time.  After speaking to some historians and experts in this particular architectural style, we concluded that the best guess was that the house was probably built in 1874.  Hence, I have always used the notation "c.1874" thus far in describing the…

As we were putting the finish on the bedroom cabinets, I reminded my dad, who is about as bad a perfectionist as I am, that it's supposed to look kinda crappy, but when it's all done, it will look incredible. OK, well, I was hoping for incredible, but would have settled for 'not bad.'

To review from my previous blog, the finish is done in layers of acrylic 'milk paint'. The first coat was a dark brown. Then we clear coated it to create separation between that color and the next color…

Last time I checked in, I had just finished the slate tile in the stairwell off the kitchen and was planning to set the kitchen tile the following weekend. There has been much progress since that blog - I finished the tile floor in the kitchen, had the awful, urine-soaked floors in the dining room, living room and sitting room sanded, stained and urethaned. The stairs to the second floor have also been sanded and stained, and we have sheetrock in the kitchen that is now primed and painted.…

Its seems that sometime in the past 60 years of DIY renovation that plywood was considered a "Wonder product"

as the walls and floors of my livingroom were covered in it. That is until today when I removed the last piece of

plywood from the walls and started on plywood abatement on the floor. I also got to thinking whilst on hands and

knees how many nails does it take to hold down a 4x8 sheet of plywood. The answer in my case was hundreds. I litterally

pulled out…

When I moved from California to Colorado to escape the city, for the last 15 years all my preservation work was with the Colorado State Historical fund.  About one year ago I ventured back into the consumer market.  Since I been back I have meet many homeowners and visited many historic homes.  One common thread I have witness is how unqualified general contractors have severely damage many beautiful historic homes in the Denver metro area.  The horror stories that homeowners have shared and…

4 years ago, I purchased an antebellum home for an investment as it had acreage near a thriving lake community.  Needless to say, the economy went south and I have had difficulty renting to good rentors.  At this point, I have sunk

additional monies in this place and cannot afford to do so any longer.  I would like to keep the land and either sell the home and have it moved, dismantle and reclaim the wood, or tear the structure down.  Are there any  suggestions as

to how this…

I have a 1924 Craftsman style house in need of some new plumbing.  As part of this project I need to replace the bath fixtures.  The problem I am having is that my current fixtures are 10" on center.  Three handles 5" apart.  The current standard is apparently 8" center.  I have found one brand where the valves are independent and can be assemble how you like.  The problem is that I have never heard of them and they start at $700.00.  I was hoping someone might know of another source for…

I've recently converted a gas/electric ceiling fixture and need advice on mounting it. Fast. It's going up in a couple of weeks.

The guys at Lowes and the local hardware store thought the wiring would be difficult. It wasn't. I just followed what I think was done originally, snaking a wire guided by bead chain up the gas pipe on the gas side and flattening a wire next to the pipe on the electric side. Because each arm screws into the cast iron pipe base separately and because there's…

I had the best dog ever. (Don't all of us dog people think that?) I can't even begin to describe her awesomeness, but gushing about dogs is a lot like gushing about children. Nobody really wants to hear it. So I'll spare you. Anyway, after 16 years of companionship, I had to put my best girl down. I couldn't handle even the slightest notion of having another dog, and soon after, I sold my house and spent the next 6 years living in apartments - not a good doggie environment. After that amount…

Anyone planning on coming to the preview party this Friday? We'll be out there with our editors (well, at least Demetra Aposporos and Patricia Poore--Clare Martin had an unfortunate roller derby incident!) and some of our favorite restoration professionals and designer craftsmen, plotting our purchases for Saturday and Sunday. Here are a few things we have our eyes on:…

My last blog post was October 20, 2010, and I was waiting for my tile saw to arrive. It is now January 10, 2011. I didn't want to blog again until I was completely done with my bathroom - right or wrong, good or bad, crappy tile job or not. Well, I am pleased (in that Cheshire Cat sort of pleased) to report that the bathroom is done, the tile saw was a champ, and I have moved my restoration work downstairs. I will not be silent for 2-1/2 months before blogging again (lucky readers!) - things…

The real estate listing sheet indicated that the house was built in 1880.  I then communicated with a local historian who found an old map of the region prepared in 1875, and the house is clearly shown in the map then.  So that's how I found out that the house is older than initially thought.  Then began my quest to dig into the history of my house.  We found that the first resident of the house was an architect by the name of Samuel M. Barton.  Well, at least he was listed as "an architect"…