There may be only one in this shot but I assure you there are two swarthy dudes laying down the first coat right now…
Posts Tagged ‘remodel’
floor finishing is happening
Monday, April 30th, 2012get your feet on the floor
Friday, April 27th, 2012… everybody rock and roll! Think you can name that tune?
So with the ceiling now finished downstairs, the floor is in motion. No wasting time here, nuh-uh. David and Joe are gettin’ down to bidness, if ya know what I mean…
The floating cork planks are huge — 12″x36″ and 1/2″ thick, so theoretically the floor should go down even faster than the ceiling…
There’s some trimming involved to get things to fit…
But these things snap together easy-peasy…
Work began yesterday and already the boys are more than halfway done!
happenings
Monday, April 9th, 2012Before we get started, I apologize for some text and spacing issues the blog seems to be experiencing. Hmmmm. Can’t figure that one out.
So here’s what you missed since I got slammed with work:
The ceiling is now completely tiled in cork (click to biggify the grandness)…
Something about it says eco-chic luxury spa, doesn’t it? The planks will get a protective finish tomorrow and the floor will be prepped for cork installation after that.
I mentioned the other day that Rob has been busy giving us light. The ceiling fixtures are in now…
Best of all — they actually work! Illumination. I dig it.
Also ongoing: tiling the bathroom. Our friend and fellow remodeling pro Mark Cummins has been prepping the walls, furring them out (building them up with wood shims) such that the diminutive wall tiles we’ve chosen will space out perfectly and require no cutting. That required a good amount of mocking-up and measuring. (And patience.) Followed by much re-measuring and marking, just to be safe…
Once Mark was confident we had it right, the 1/2″ cement board went up. In the shower, it’s gone from this…
To this…
That’s the hand-held shower pipe poking through on the right. There will likely be an inset section in that wall for setting soap and sundries… a complication but hopefully not an impossibility. After that, water-based waterproofing and then tiling.
At this rate we may actually have a functional downstairs by summer. Doh! I just cursed us, didn’t I? Fudge.
it’s the little things
Saturday, April 7th, 2012A big box of electrical devices for downstairs arrived the other day…
I’ll admit that doesn’t sound very exciting and perhaps not even post-worthy. But what looks like a boring box of switchplates and outlets to you looks like finally having lighting downstairs to me. No more flashlights!
Rob, our electrician extraordinaire, is downstairs wiring in the devices as I type this…
We chose these because the cover plate snaps on — no screws showing…
Clean. Squared off profile doesn’t hurt… there’s no beveled edge on these. Ridiculous that I even care about such a thing but there you go.
the planking edition
Monday, April 2nd, 2012Ruefully late to the meme, our remodel is finally the site of a planking…
No, not that planking. This planking…
Destined for the floor and ceiling, boxes and boxes of cork planks (Edipo from DuroDesign) have been waiting patiently since last summer…
David and Joe started under the stairs — an out of the way place to practice installing these for the first time. First there was adhesive…
Then the planks went on, staggered…
Almost done…
Sorry, it’s a little dim under there and the shots aren’t so great. It looks nice, take my word for it.
The reason we chose the Edipo was for its linear strips…
We want those strips to run the length of the house rather than the width, because upstairs the angled ceiling that runs front to back is a feature we want to accentuate. Downstairs, the ceiling is flat rather than angled, of course, but it makes sense to be consistent with what we’re planning for upstairs. To that end, the tiling began with a long reference line to keep the planks straight…
The first plank went up and then the boys worked their way down the hall…
You really have to like the guy you’re working with to do this job…
And so the planking continues…
Moving pretty quickly now. This could be done some time tomorrow… well, hopefully.
Very happy with the cork thus far, I must say. How happy? Dancing on the ceiling happy!
the deck: where we left off
Thursday, March 29th, 2012Let’s see, what’s been going on at the homestead since I last had time to share?
Removing the siding on the inside of the deck surround…
Turns out the wall on the west side of the deck was completely soggy to the point of rotting…
It absolutely reeks of mildew and was covered in slimy goo. Gross. The wood on that side is not salvageable, unfortunately. Especially once you add in the carpenter ant damage…
They love wood that’s been softened up by poor drainage. Luckily we got rid of the ants right after we moved in.
So where does that leave us? The walls are temporarily covered in housewrap to keep out the spring rains…
And now there’s a slight pause in the rebuild of the deck while we wait for the engineer to chime in. On what, you ask? Biggify this and check out the deck as the architect imagined it in 1970…
Cantilevered. No supports.
Compare that to how it actually got built a year later…
A single post stuck in the middle. Well, not exactly the middle — slightly off-center so that it wouldn’t interfere with coming and going through the lower slider. Weird.
Compare that to how it looks now…
At some point, posts were added to either end in addition to the one in the center. David and I think this looks a little clunky and have always imagined we’d try to go back to Irving Hayne’s original vision if possible. Next week, Eric over at Structures Workshop should come back to us with drawings and we’ll find out if we can make it happen. Good man. We’ve tapped him more than once for this remodel.
when maffmaticians remodel
Thursday, March 15th, 2012David and Joe are downstairs planning the layout for the cork ceiling…
There was math…
What does it all mean?
I have no idea.
let there be sun!
Monday, March 12th, 2012Progress, people! On the front of the house, Joe and David made and added the flashing to the upstairs windows and slider to match what they did on the lower level…
And now the siding is done, top to bottom…
Wait, is that SUNSHINE reflected in the upstairs window? IT IS!
The blue tarp that’s been up since well before Thanksgiving finally came down!
One…
Two…
Three! No more tarp!
I can’t tell you how happy I am to no longer be in the abyss!
Next: the soffit will get closed up…
After that, David and Joe will turn their attention back to the downstairs. They’re going to install the cork on the floor and ceiling. Then it will be time to rebuild the deck.
I still can’t get over being able to see the view…
Just in time for spring!
and the siding?
Thursday, March 8th, 2012Painting is done — shall attempt better shots. Siding is still in progress but the bottom floor is just about done. Yay!…
That black mesh in the shot above goes beneath the siding…
Called Cedar Breather, it creates a 1/4″ air space between the house wrap and the back of the siding so that moisture can’t build up there. After all, it’s water that encourages paint and stain peel off the wood, causes rot and mold, and invites insects to dine. Better not to give it a chance.
Around the slider, Joe and David created and installed aluminum flashing to match what they did around the window…
So instead of the bulkier wood trim that used to surround the windows and doors, now we have a nice, clean metal edge…
Looks fantastic, boys!
Really loving how the dark stain worked out!
sneak peek
Tuesday, March 6th, 2012Downstairs painting is coming along nicely! Yesterday the tinted primer went on…
And today the first coat went on…
Actually, it’s still going on right now. It’s so strange to have someone painting for me. This is usually my job. But look how much quicker its going!