Queen Anne's Revenge

the Wirsing School's family

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Wed, 28 Mar 2018 15:45:00 +0000

In the past year, two different branches of the Wirsing School's original family have reached out through the blog. This is astounding and wonderful, and beyond gratifying. I would say that it's incomprehensible to think that such a charming little place almost met such an undignified end, but, with grand mansions being torn down every day we know that's not true. Still, the little schoolhouse that could must have known it had a fan club, it's the only thing explaining why it still managed to stay (mostly) upright.

Here's a bit of it's history, in photos...

1912 - check out the original bell tower, chimney and porch!

1967

The two photos above were sent to me by a member of the Wirsing family whose cousin, Ronda Ball, was the last Wirsing to own the schoolhouse. Her grandfather, Wayne Wirsing, bought and restored the schoolhouse in the 60's. He was born just down the lane from the schoolhouse in a farmhouse. Her 3 times great grandpa donated the land and some of the funds to build the school house in 1875, and it was in operation until 1948. The bell is not original to the school and was gone when her grandpa, Wayne, bought the school (The bell had already been stolen when we began work, what a relief to find out it wasn't original). There was a Wirsing reunion held at the school each August from 1967 until the late 1980's. There are several school desks from the schoolhouse house still in the family.

The photos below are one I just received, taken in 1999 by another Wiring descendant who was doing genealogical research. Sarah Jane Wirsing (daughter of John Wirsing and Sarah Rush) is his 4th great-grandmother.

1999

1999 - check out those wasp nests!

1999

The next few photos are the schoolhouse as we found it in early 2013, after responding to a "free stuff" posting on Craigslist. There are not enough thank yous in the world for the people who posted it...

2013

After the first coat of paint on the front following it's resurrection (see, this is a timely almost Easter post!)...

2016

More or less as she stands today below. Paint will get finished this year no matter what, as will gutters. I'm not sure I'll have time to finish restoring the beadboard shutters though.

2017

Given that Wirsing School Road no long has it's school, I think we'll be buying a replica street sign for our driveway, just in case the family reunions resume and they need to find the place...

stop gap stuffing the gaps

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 13 Jan 2018 03:26:00 +0000

We've long had issues with the pipes that run up to the third floor freezing if temps dip below zero. This has confounded us, as the pipes are in an interior wall running through the middle of the house. On the first floor they run through the curved wooden chase that everyone's so fascinated by in the dining room, and continue through the guest bedroom wall and third floor bath. When the house was built they connected the in-ground cistern to the attic cistern, which provided water pressure through gravity.

Now that the beadboard ceiling is down on the old front porch the reason for the problem has become a little less mysterious. For no particular reason, it appears that whoever built it ripped off the moldings from around the base of the roof and box gutters. This left an enormous gap all the way around the perimeter of the bay, which opened directly into the floor joists of the second floor, explaining both the floor of ice in the guest bedroom and the frozen pipes. This whole section was closed off only by the new porch roof above, and the beadboard ceiling butting up to the bay below where the moldings should have been.

Obviously we had hoped to have this demoed and repaired in the fall. While the demo work could easily get done over the winter, there are a lot of elements that need repair once the porch is gone. In addition to the new shingles over the little bay, there are also bricks to repair where pockets were created for the joists, repairing the box gutter and downspout and refinishing the doors.

So in the meantime I crept up the ladder before the current storm hit to try and close up what I could. When I went out it was 63 degrees, when I came in two hours later it was 40, raining, and windy. You know what spray foam doesn't like? The cold. Also, the wind. The spray foam I had planned on using wasn't curing, and the draft blowing into the house was so strong it was sucking the foam through. If I had had more time I would have cut foam insulation sheets down to size, but I was in a rush. And when in a rush one stuffs fiberglass batts wherever they can and hopes for the best. It has to be better than nothing right?

roofing the beast

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Thu, 04 Jan 2018 20:03:00 +0000

Now given that we haven't seen the roof for two weeks with the incredible deep freeze Pittsburgh's been having, a post about shingling the roof seems less than timely. So be it...

After much hemming and hawing we ended up going with the GAF Camelot II shingle in charcoal. We had initially called for the Camelot shingle in Sheffield Black, but that added tremendously to the price for no obvious reason other than color. This is a slate look shingle, and was well worth the slight price difference over a regular dimensional shingle.

The entire roof was wrapped in Grace Ice and Water Shield. This was not only because of the relatively low slope on some of it, but also so that the sheathing would be protected if roofing was delayed.

We also went ahead and did all the flashing in copper, along with copper ridge caps, valleys and drip edge. Copper flashing isn't as expensive as most seem to think, and in this age of lifetime rated shingles it's foolish not to use flashings that will last as long as the rest of the roof. While aluminum doesn't rust, it does get very brittle over time, and really can't compete. The visible copper really adds to the roof, and is enough of a distraction that the eye doesn't immediately realize the shingles aren't slates.

There was one complication to using these shingles that no one anticipated however, and that was the tower roof. Our roofer (Deluca Roofing for the locals, and highly recommended) was familiar with cutting individual shingles to accommodate the curve of the conical roof, but there was no real way to cut and lay these shingles properly since they vary in shape and are layered as you can see in the above photo. The front of the tower looks fine, and the inconsistencies are mostly hidden on the back. It's a relatively minor disappointment, but something to consider if you're planning a similar project.

I also restored the last antique weathervane which is mounted on the tower peak. It's nowhere near as exceptional as the schoolhouse weathervane, but I deliberately chose something that wouldn't compete with the original spire on the main tower roof. Not to mention the price was right, and it had it's original mount, which can be quite difficult to find.

All that's left is installing copper gutters and downspouts. I'm sure the price on the radius gutter will be nothing short of heart stopping, so we'll kick that can down the road as long as we're able. If anyone's interested in the planning behind the roof check out the posts from this year. There was a lot of head-scratching involved in both the products used and the construction.

columns and Christmas lights

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Tue, 19 Dec 2017 03:07:00 +0000

The turned porch posts went in at the end of October. They are tremendously beautiful. Each one is 10 feet tall, and turned from an 8x8 post. Anything smaller would have been under-scaled, and I'm pleased we got this part right.

The posts themselves were custom turnings purchased from Mr. Spindle in North Dakota. We worked with them to perfect the pattern based on the historic photos of the house. My only complaint is that posts of this scale are only availible as laminated cedar. BUT, most companies don't even stock 8x8 posts, and those that do only have them in laminated woods, mostly pine, and all for considerably more than we paid. Customer service was beyond exceptional (the owner or general manager picked up every time I called), and I'm just so damn pleased it all worked out.

Initially we had only planned to buy the two posts that would flank the porch window salvaged from the porch we tore down. That window is 10x7, and we didn't want disassemble and remount it when we got around to doing the final columns (our initial plan had been to use 6x6 posts temporarily). I had talked at length with several different companies, and it was just happenstance that I talked to Bob (the owner) last. I'm a sucker for anyone who wants to see photos of my house and know its history, and at that point I knew the price he offered to turn the posts for wouldn't be beat. We paid $5000 for the posts (yes, it hurts to write that number down). To put that number in perspective, other companies had quoted us $1200 for a custom 6x6 in finger jointed pine, we paid $500 a post for ten 8x8 cedar posts.

The only mistake made is on my shoulders. In the historic photos you'll see the routed detail at the top and bottom of the posts.

I'm willing to bet the scale and router bits used to create it are identical to the box posts on the juliet balcony off the second floor bath.

clearly I need new posts, any volunteers?

This complex detail would have to had been done by hand on the already turned posts, and understandably, no one really wanted to risk ruining the posts. Our builder would have done it had I pushed, but I was overwhelmed enough at that point (and lacking the funds to buy more posts if they were ruined in the process) that I settled for a much simpler set up.

It's one of an infinite number of things that will bother me that no one else will notice. It's clear though that the shallow routing has much less impact than the original....

The posts are mounted to a square piece of AZEK on the bottom, so they don't wick moisture from the porch floor. The bottom of each post is wrapped in a beveled ceder trim to match the original. Regrettably I didn't have an opportunity to get the posts painted before it got too cold, but the ends and all contact points have been coated with an excellent oil primer. I also got primer on where the turning ends at the bottom of the posts. That tapered bit was quite porous, and I hated the thought of snow just sitting there all winter with no protection from the moisture.

figuring out the border

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Fri, 15 Dec 2017 01:37:00 +0000

Shockingly, it was the border around the porch floor that created the most enduring drama of the build, THE BORDER! Now the idea of a border around the deck is straightforward enough. It would dress up the edges, protect the end grain of the boards, and sit under the columns so that new flooring could be added without impacting anything structural. Perhaps most importantly it would dress up the huge expanse of boring deck boards, and bring them just a little bit of class. We considered doing it in 5/4 treated pine, ipe or cumuru (tropical hardwoods), and AZEK.

A huge area, especially when measured in tiny toddler feet.

The pine was a no go for obvious reasons, we wanted to avoid having to replace it (preferably forever), not to mention it's prone to cupping and splitting. The ipe and cumuru are beautiful, but they are notorious for not holding paint well (i.e. if they started to fail we wouldn't be able to paint them to extend their life), and they're prone to splitting in dry weather. Additionally, the widths and lengths we'd need to cut to build up the curve of the gazebo would add considerably to the price, and have left us with many seams. This left AZEK. I'm as wary as anyone about putting plastic on an old house, but there are times when it's a life saver. In the case of this porch it will make up the border, and parts of the fascia and skirting on the gazebo. Now, one of the greatest things about AZEK is that it bends, and AZEK makes a special heating blanket just for this purpose. Could I find one to rent or borrow anywhere on the planet? No, and I called EVERYWHERE... Luckily I had the brains to call corporate, and they put me in touch with the western PA rep. He had a blanket. He came out to bend the boards for us. FOR FREE.

The deck boards were left long and cut down with a track saw on the straight sides, and a router on the gazebo. The AZEK trim was bent around the curve so that it matched the radius perfectly. While this was happening the temporary porch supports were cut and supported as each piece was installed. No one's quite sure how the section facing the stairs will fair with frequent foot traffic, so we made sure that section can be removed and replaced if it becomes an issue in the future.

The stick and nail trick was used several times to perfect the curve, including marking for the final decking cuts

Specifications for the lumber and deck stain we're planning to use recommend waiting a year before finishing, so I guess we're done with the deck until summer.

decking the porch

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Wed, 13 Dec 2017 20:20:00 +0000

No, I don't mean in Christmas decorations, rather, we're going back in time to early October. Blogging, it's magic....

First though, a stop in August, just after my last post, to pay homage to the most perfectly Cromulent of cats. Crom passed here at home. He was around 17. We were devastated. I lost all interest in working in the yard without him by my side. Months later I'm still checking the price on his food at Costco and getting up to let him in when it starts to rain. He and Jack are both buried under the porch - Jack can guard the doors while Crom can watch the world pass by and greet each and every passerby.

Fast forward to October, and once again Toren's birthday (two!) is spurring a flurry of work. Unlike last year, the weather was looking to be glorious, and we decided we'd be celebrating on the porch. The porch that had no floors. We knew from the get go that we wouldn't be able to afford proper tongue and groove decking. 5/4 deck boards were really the only option, and even these would be quite expensive given how expansive our porch is. We made sure that we installed the boards in such a way that they could be removed and replaced with better materials when they started to fail. A variety of lengths of premium lumber were ordered based on a scaled drawing we made to minimize joints and waste. We even paid to have them delivered. The wood that was delivered was garbage. While some of the boards were standard boards that got mixed in (a serious issue in it's own right considering they charged us for premium grade), only half of the pieces were usable. The store manager agreed to pay for a trailer and a hefty discount, so we brought back the junk boards, picked out new ones and came home. Thus our first day was completely shot.

Day two started with a yard full of decking, still soaked from the lumberyard (KDAT is a total joke). We picked through to find the driest boards, back priming them with some high quality deck stain that I found on the oops shelf for a song. We marked the edge lines of the border to make sure the deck boards hit or overlapped it (to be trimmed later) and squared the first row to the house. Initially we started using the Marksman Edge tool to install the boards, which advertised no gaps and hidden fasteners. It was garbage, which necessitated another trip out to the store to pick up the Marksman Pro, which gives 3/16 spacing and hidden fasteners. This tool worked beautifully and I recommend it, although our decking looks much more deckish with the gaps, which I was trying to avoid.

The first several rows went in, and we noticed something strange... Gaps and curves started appearing. We were distraught. Careful measuring revealed the boards not only varied in thickness and width by a 1/4 inch from one another, they also could vary end to end by a similar amount.

To say we were pissed is the understatement of the century. Our anger must have carried through over the phone. They refunded our entire $1200 purchase price, and told us to keep the boards. On the one hand, yes, this was a bit of a windfall. On the other hand, a project that should have taken a couple of days took weeks with a disappointing final result (although we're the only ones who'll notice the flaws). We ended up measuring each board to insure the same width boards were used throughout the row. Boards that tapered were used to fix the arcs that had formed.

Some other notes about the installation...
- The bottoms and all cut edges are back primed.
- The boards meet in a herringbone pattern that extends from the corner of the house through the gazebo.

- The edges were left long to be cut back when the border was installed. The curve on the porch was done using a narrow board loosely nailed in the center of the gazebo to mark the circumference.
- We routed all cut edges to match the factory rounded edges.

curves in all the right places

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 02:14:00 +0000

The most difficult part of the actual construction, building the two curved beams, ended up going quite smoothly.

We looked at lots of options for how to go about creating them, including cutting them out of solid stock, ordering prefab beams, or curving the trim over an angled structure. None of the prefab companies seemed to guarantee the materials they were using, so given that and the lead times we didn't pursue that any further.

The easiest option turned out being building laminated beams on site. They're constructed from thin marine plywood cut into strips, screwed, clamped, and laminated together with marine epoxy. The dimensions were all determined by our engineer. If you attempt to do this yourself, do not underestimate how many clamps you'll need!

The curve was made by attaching the strips directly to the angled floor joists. Quite to our surprise, the header beam was built first, using the floor joists to shape it. Once it had cured they attached it to 2x6's (on edge) to maintain the shape and help lift it, as well as a ratchet strap on the open edge.

Once it was finished it was moved to the side, and the curved joist was built in it's place.

Lots of work and planning, but straightforward enough. Now, if only curved handrail were as easy!

porch posts

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 29 Jul 2017 03:54:00 +0000

Our original plan had been to use 6x6 posts to support the porch for the time being (due to budget, naturally). We were going to chamfer the edges to dress them up a bit, and leave them until we had a chance to mug Toren's tooth fairy for additional funds.

We'll be reinstalling the enormous porch window (the only element saved from the porch we demolished), so we were interested in installing the permanent columns to either side of it. We wanted to get this done at this stage because pulling out and replacing the temporary columns would be complicated and expensive.

So, quotes were obtained, and as expected, they were disgusting. One place quoted me 1200 per column for finger-jointed pine. Another followed up their initial e-mail with another e-mail two days later after I hadn't yet replied with a "was it something I said" e-mail. Weird. Even weirder was an incredibly friendly e-mail, with a reasonable quote attached! The quote was reasonable enough that we're sucking it up and buying all the columns from them, custom 10 foot 8x8s in western red cedar for $550 apiece. Once they're on site I'll be more specific about the quality, for now I'm cautiously optimistic.

I'm posting the enhanced images here, along with their drawings, just in case your eyes pick up on details we've missed. You'll notice the incised carvings don't appear on the drawing, that's only because they're unsure if they'll be able to do them. If they can't our builders will...

clarifications

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Wed, 26 Jul 2017 03:38:00 +0000

Those with keen eyes (ahem Ross), will surely have noticed that the porch we happen to be building is not quite the one the house was born with.

But in fact, the beautiful porch photo I'm so fond of posting isn't the porch the house was born with either.

Thornfield, approximately 1915

This grand ol' dame has had some serious work done over the years.

Thornfield, approximately 1886

Then she let herself go entirely...

2010, as purchased (fence was added by us)

Thornfield used to be comprised of a rather large estate, with the house facing down the hill, towards what soon became the Westinghouse Switch and Signal (where Tesla worked in 1888, Nikola Tesla has seen my house!!!). When Kelly sold the house in 1911, he also subdivided the estate into smaller parcels, both above and below the main house. These lots continued to be built up with small capes and foursquares until the 30's. Looking at the historic photo with the white trim, the original porch entrance was under the gable roof on the porch, directly in front of the entry doors, with a hidden stair on the other end of the porch. The second owners undertook a massive campaign to colonial revivalize the house, and added the gorgeous curved stairs to the gazebo, and closed in the original stairs with a paneled balustrade (and possibly extended the porch deck past the roof).

In this modern age however, neither stair will work. The first iteration would force people to walk around the entire front of the house, into a very narrow side yard to enter the house. The second stair actually curves away from the main walking path directly into the path of my favorite oak tree and down a very steep hill.

Hill, Tree, and a long wet walk from the sidewalk and driveway

My solution is to duplicate the original gable on what is now the main facade of the house, closer to the sidewalk and driveway, and adding a bit of detail to what was originally the side of the house. The entry doors are being rebuilt in their original location. The stairs will be simple and cheap at this stage, at some distant point we'll duplicate the curvaceous stone stairs from the teens.

I don't often say this about substantial changes I'm making to the house, but I feel fairly confident this is the right path.

have I got updates for you!

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sun, 23 Jul 2017 12:30:00 +0000

I've had a few too many people complement the deck I'm building...

I'm almost to the point of laminating the historic house pictures in all their glory and mounting them in the front yard just so people stop COMPLEMENTING MY FUCKING DECK!!!!

On the other hand, the porch is coming along nicely...

I haven't been writing because the whole process has been completely overwhelming. Decisions that should be easy are all counterbalanced by our inability to afford building things as they should be. The starry-eyed fairy me should just be able to wave her wand and have the various woodland creatures (not to mention a toddler who may as well be a wild animal) wield the tools and get to work. I just can't fathom why people aren't lining up to build it for me.

Anyway...

I'll do my best to start to detail the building process later this week, but for now I need some design help. The porch roof was originally cedar shakes, these will not be reinstated. In an ideal world I'd use the synthetic slates, which would match the main roof, but allow us to walk on them when necessary for gutter cleaning and Christmas lights. Those however, are way out of budget. This leaves us with asphalt. When we bought the house we were told that very little of the original slate would be salvageable due to it's age and how much of it was coated with tar.

We got an excellent price on new blue slates, and used these on the angles not seen from the front of the house - since we thought most of the slate would be this blue slate, we used matching blue-green asphalt on the back of the house and the schoolhouse. Well, much to everyone's surprise, our slates turned out to be Buckingham, and were in much better condition than anyone believed possible. So, I have a patchwork roof of blue and black. This was a screw-up of epic proportions that I can't forgive myself for, and it makes choosing shingles very difficult. The roofs remaining are the porch and front and back of the kitchen wing. We have enough original Buckingham for the front of the kitchen wing, so the decision is whether to match the porch roof to the blue or the black. I'm leaning towards this shingle to match the Buckingham. It has a nice mix of dark gray and black, with a bit of red that matches staining from years of industrial pollution.

So, am I on the right track?

the porch begins

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 11 Mar 2017 04:18:00 +0000

So sure, removing a window may not seem like a big deal... But it signifies that the porch is really, finally, thankfully, going forward. At nearly 8x10, it's also not just any window. Other than clearing out a spot in the schoolhouse, I did not have to be involved in the delicate task in the least, which holds a perverse sort of pleasure.

While the window isn't original to the house (it dates to the split in the 20's), it's quite lovely and will serve a valuable purpose. As mentioned before, and in great evidence this week, the weather roars up the hill like a freight train and pummels that side of the house. The window will be mounted on the far side of the porch adjacent to the front doors, so it will offer them some degree of protection. It'll also help protect the mail women from the attentions of our giant dog.

Now that the window is safely away we're free to begin demolition. We used the last warm day this week (and for the foreseeable future) to take down the beadboard ceiling. It seems clear that this was definitely salvaged from the original porch, and is *squeal* double-sided, which means no paint-stripping! We have two decent piles of salvaged beadboard, and we're hopeful that one of them will prove to be a match. If so, and paired with the other front porch that's coming down, we may have just enough to complete the new porch.

And if you're wondering about the resurgence of winter, well, you have me to thank. A couple of weeks ago we took off the stops on the triple windows in the big room on the third floor - I've been slowly finishing the room, including stripping the paint.

While I won't be able to restore the sashes till summer, I wanted to get as much taken care of now so it can get light use as a guest room. I knew the move was presumptive, but as a couple of glorious spring-like weeks passed, I thought I had outsmarted the cold. As it turns out, snow just laughs when you take the stops away from windows that are actively decomposing, missing glass, and have no glazing putty. Given the snow on the floor, and the chimney effect sucking the heat out of the house, I took down the velvet portieres from the parlor and hung them in front of the windows... Winter. Outsmarted....

Villa Vizcaya

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Fri, 17 Feb 2017 01:56:00 +0000

My husband's grandmother unexpectedly passed last week, which brought us to Miami for several days. We all needed to get out of the house for a bit, so we took advantage of some beautiful weather to head to the Deering Estate to clear our heads. Although we tried to go more than once while living in Miami, it was always closed for events. They were setting up for a huge wedding while we were there (likely costing far more than we make in a year), but it didn't ruin the visit, just the photos... While the photos aren't great, I'd say they're not bad for wrangling a toddler, and that same teething boy is the reason not a single one is edited!

Villa Vizcaya was begun in 1914, and the main house was finished in 1916. It contains countless antiquities brought over from Europe, including a stone console purportedly from Pompeii. As usual, you're better off getting the history from Wikipedia, but here are some photos including many details that caught my attention. The estate was restored by the original decorator in 1934 following the Miami Hurricane of 1926, with the intention of opening it as a museum.

marble drain in the courtyard

the flower room

the iron fireback was a phoenix

telephone closet

beautiful call bells throughout

you can see the toilet in the corner

even museums have water damage...

dragon curtain tieback

stunning paint color combinations

there are no less than three butler's pantries in the house

stone console from Pompeii

hidden air intake

These photos refused to behave and let themselves be put in any sort of order, so oh well. But as you can see, the house was built in the prime time of early technologies. Servants bells, each with a unique pull, call buttons, annunciators, dumbwaiters, a variety of electric switches, and one of my favorite things - engraved switchplates. Not to mention a telephone closet for Ross...

slogging through stripping

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 28 Jan 2017 04:23:00 +0000

I've been slowing picking at the paint stripping on the third floor for the past 6 months, specifically in the big bedroom that will at some point be Toren's. The walls have been plastered for almost 2 years now, and the ongoing radiator drama was resolved this fall (which warrants a post of it's own). I was trying to be reasonable and planned on just repainting the trim, but the paint in the room was in such poor condition due to all the water and lack of heating that there was no way it could be painted over. And just a PSA, if one more person tells me either that private spaces and/or pine was painted in Victorians I'm going to cram my dental picks up their ass. Every house is different. My entire house had either shellacked or grained trim. The second and third floors were entirely shellacked pine. Please don't use these supposed rules to justify painting trim. This room's trim is far less detailed than the rest of the house, so heat gunning was almost a pleasure. Of course, the devil's in the details, so it's still slow going....

Once the trim is sanded I'll move on to painting the walls, ceiling and floor (restoring the sashes will wait till warm weather). The last paint scheme that was completed was mint walls with peach doors and trim, perhaps some time in the 50's. It would have been charming were it not for the room collapsing around it. And this is where it gets complicated. Like the rest of the house, all the rooms up here were fully papered (wall and ceilings) multiple times. And the papers up here were pretty cool, and almost modern in their designs. This room was papered with what appears to be a dogwood pattern on the walls, and a chrysanthemum pattern on the ceiling originally.

For all this time I had thought they were metallic inks on neutral grounds, but pulling down the peeling paper and crumbling plaster in the closet revealed another story altogether. The dogwood paper appears to have originally been a mottled green/yellow with deep purple and rust metallic inks. These have faded to beige and silver. Urg. As best I can tell, in the dark closet the sun didn't have a chance to bleach the inks. The moral of the story is that I'm at an impasse in deciphering colors. If I had a firm grip on the colors I would gladly reproduce them. The beauty of these patterns is that I should be able to have them turned into a stencil, but again, it's a shame to put in all the hours stenciling the pattern while getting the colors wrong.

The best I could capture the actual colors...

Another wrench in the plan is that this will be a boy's room. And perhaps it's a bit unfair to smother him in flowers. Which is why I'm considering using the second ceiling paper instead...

I know, it's very mod. But trust me, it's a very early paper. Those Victorians were just ahead of their time, and my Victorian's Victorians had exceptionally good taste! This layer was never added to the closet, so I have no way of gauging the actual colors. Normally I'd just assume it was some variation of cream and silver, but I now know that's not necessarily the case. At this point the plan is to keep the walls a fairly neutral greenish taupe, the floor a deep teal, with a light tan stenciled ceiling - all chosen so as to not compete with the restored Queen Anne windows. But as always, I'm open to suggestions.

happy merry everything

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sun, 25 Dec 2016 17:35:00 +0000

This fall and winter have been busy. All of the holidays that matter have piled up upon one another (I didn't even tell you that we had the kid's first birthday luau in the finished schoolhouse), and in just this next week we have Hanukkah, Christmas, HAMukkah and New Years. So happy everything friends!

On a less festive note, while on our way to capture a Christmas tree our car was totaled. While thankfully everyone involved was fine, we weren't quite ready to part with the car, or the money for it's replacement. Where this leaves the porch fund is anyone's guess, and it's something we'll just have to figure out in the new year. Nonetheless, meet Hagrid, our Expedition EL, and officially the newest used car I've ever owned, not to mention the biggest. Lets just put it this way... I can fit whole sheets of blueboard and plywood in the trunk, and we could have towed the whole schoolhouse home with it.

I hope your holidays were much less dramatic, and that if you find new cars in the driveway they were left there by Santa. Many thanks for reading and sticking with me through these past few years, I hope you all have a fabulous holiday!

in watercolor

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 10 Dec 2016 14:35:00 +0000

Some of you may know that little old Thornfield won Old House Journal's spine contest a month back! A perk of this was a custom house portrait by Rob Leanna. The portrait is here, and it's beautiful. In fact, it looks like one of the hand colored drawings from a period builders catalog, which is pretty much perfect...

before the snow flies

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Thu, 01 Dec 2016 00:22:00 +0000

The weather has finally changed enough that I think winter may actually be just around the corner. This long warm fall was a blessing, but as is typical with projects, I still failed to get my punch list finished.

As I mentioned before, there's little in the way of helpful photos in this post. Organizing and transferring photos has been an onerous task, and I was so disgruntled over the summer I just stopped taking them...

On the "before winter list" were a bunch of long overdue pile consolidations, with buggy wood trashed or burnt, a bunch put on it's respective surfaces where it belongs, and cutoffs given away as wildly desirable barnwood (strange, school wood doesn't carry the same cache). I also got around to winterizing the basement doors - and while I didn't get a chance to paint them, I did paint a bunch of other bits and pieces. Included in those bits and pieces were the smallest gable, and the pair of dining room windows.

Check out that vinyl!
I'm not exactly sure what possessed me to rip it down, but my gut was right...

Money ran out for new storm windows, so the window restoration of the bay will wait. Getting the existing broken triple tracks out will be hellish, and is just not worth doing until we have something to replace them. We also need to replace many missing bullseyes, but again, it'll have to wait...

Also done is the onerous digging of the french drain. There seems to have been a stream that once came down the hill, which through the years now translates into a torrent of groundwater that was keeping the new brick floor of the schoolhouse perpetually damp. We dug down and put in a small retaining wall of cinder blocks we've dug up from around the property about three feet from the schoolhouse, and installed the french drain up against the sonotube foundation. There was nothing special about the install - landscape fabric, gravel, perforated pipe etc... but it wraps around the side and back of the building and seems to be doing a stellar job. We still need gutters, but at least we can push them back a couple of years.

The wall used up the last of the block, for which I'm beyond grateful, and it doesn't look too terrible. At least, comparatively I suppose. The rest of the super huge blocks (which we think were the foundation to the most recent garage on the property) were stacked to finish off the retaining wall where Mount Trashmore once was. It'll have to be redone as some distant point, but for now seems like it'll be fine.

There's been a bunch of other happenings, hopefully I'll be able to catch you all up in the next couple of weeks, before turning attention to porch planning and interior winter work.

six years

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sun, 20 Nov 2016 20:26:00 +0000

Well, our housiversary seems a logical time to start trying to post again doesn't it? While I have several posts in draft form, the issues with One Drive discontinuing their guaranteed unlimited storage and subsequently blocking access made organizing and accessing photos for the posts impossible. We're using dropbox now, since we already used it for work. But it's been a steep learning curve for me, and a long process to transfer and attempt to organize our photos. I may just publish the drafts sans photos, if I don't they'll never get posted.

In any case, work has been continuing! The schoolhouse is officially done and is only awaiting the rest of it's paint and the restoration of it's shutters (next spring). The Karmann Ghia is finally parked INSIDE, and it's a wonder to behold. Various patches and repairs have been done on the exterior, including two restored windows and a small gable. The radiator that we pulled from the now demolished rectory has also finally been restored and is installed and working.

Perhaps the biggest revelation is that the great porch rebuilding will be beginning in April. At this point our current entry porch is beginning to fold in half and collapse, and I can't bear the thought of investing time and money into propping the decrepit thing back up. Even the bare bones version of the rebuild is costing at least 5,000 more than we have to spend because of the work involved in the curved gazebo and conical roof. The logical thing to do would be to rebuild it as a polygon, but where's the fun in that? This initial iteration of the porch will consist of a painted osb floor, and 6x6 porch posts to save on money, and similarly, we'll cobble together something for the railings. Like resurrecting the staircase, the priority is the structure, the decorative details can come later. I'm sure I'll have a tremendous number of questions as we go on, but first I suppose it makes sense to make sure people are still out there reading.

So, on this first wintery day, make yourselves warm alcoholic beverages and toast to year six of Thornfield's restoration!

selling off

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Wed, 24 Aug 2016 19:10:00 +0000

Pittsburgh is not overly large, nor does it particularly care about it's history. And its people, by and large, are not super enamoured with antiques. While these things sadden me, they also make it possible for me to obtain lots of stuff that I couldn't otherwise afford. Some of this stuff, as it turns out, I don't need. And although it's fun for me to take them out of their packing and pet them sometimes, I'd much rather they be used and appreciated. To that end, when we head to NYC this week to see the Dresden Dolls (tickets to which were my mother's day present) I'm planning on bringing some of my lighting to sell. I desperately need money for the porch, so this must happen.

Off to the big city is a pair of Tudor Revival 5 light chandeliers, with their original bronze and iron finish.

And sure, while those are pretty spiffy they can't hold a candle to my set of 15 aluminum Art Deco slip shade fixtures.

The coolest pull chain switch ever, just fyi...

And yes, by set I mean a matched set, including one 5 light chandelier, 3 two light drop fixtures, 3 two light flush mount fixtures and 8 single shade sconces (obviously, I have all the shades as well, but they are meticulously wrapped and stashed away). The pictures clearly don't do them justice, but this isn't ebay is it?

I'm not in the habit of using this blog as a platform for selling, but I post these here because I KNOW no salvage yard will give a hoot about keeping the set together. But, it's important to me. So, if any of you dear readers feel that you must have either set, do let me know. Obviously, rewiring and some paint stripping will be required... And don't forget, the deco fixtures are famous, as they're the ones that were rented for The Last Witchhunter (I'll ask them to keep their egos in check). And if you know of any other contractors that buy a house just for its huge garage and can't get rid of its pink fixtures fast enough, send them my way.

Driehaus Museum

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sat, 13 Aug 2016 03:18:00 +0000

In clearing out my desktop (it's too miserable here to be doing much of anything else), I realized I never posted the last of the photos from last years Chicago trip. What should be the most beautiful of the posts is somewhat lacking. Lets just blame the combination of crowds, dim lighting and stained glass. It's fairly easy to find excellent overall photos of the sumptuous interiors of the Driehaus Museum, but here are some details of interest (tile, Tiffany and delicious floors especially). And a tip; make sure you sneak into the opposite sex bathrooms, the woodwork and tile in each is exquisite, and not worth missing just because you have the wrong sex bits.

So, as usual, in no particular order...

color

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Mon, 08 Aug 2016 02:11:00 +0000

So, I'm thinking it's officially a Victorian carriage house.

After a century without, I hope the two get along with one another. It's likely a close match to what was there originally, although the photo below is all we have to go on. And, as far as we know, it never housed horses, but rather a chauffeur and an automobile that featured prominently in all the social pages (although, cruelly, they never mention what kind)!

The photo was strategically taken, as all but the front is awaiting paint (and the front is awaiting additional coats in places), and only about half of the sashes are glazed. Still, it's gratifying, even if moving the big ladder is still a bit agonizing.

So, do we think the fascia should be green, or blackish purple like the doors? It's the only placement I can't seem to commit to... In the oldest photo of the house the trim does seem to be darkest around the topmost moldings (which are actually the built in gutters). But I haven't made it up there to scrape and see for myself. As an aside, we're certain the sashes were originally Indian red, and there's evidence of early bronze green and purplish black, hence our choices. As for locations of said colors, nothing seems to add up in that department. Keep in mind, the first floor brick is dark red, and the upper shingles have always been dark brown. By 1920, the entirety of the house's trim had been colonial revivalized in mustard, at that point the sashes may have still been red, or may have already been painted black. All the careful scraping in the world won't tell you what was what color when. Oy!

keep it simple stupid

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Thu, 28 Jul 2016 02:08:00 +0000

Work keeps getting done, and I keep not posting about it. So instead of being overwhelmed by the backlog, here's what I did today.

Bought this for 40, almost walked away because the shades (the only reason I was interested) were weirding me out - too thick, awkwardly sized with the iridized interior not continuing to the fitter rim. Until I start selling fixtures again I can't obtain any more pan fixtures, they seem to multiply like stray kittens once they reach my basement, so the shades needed to be special.

As it turns out, the shades are the real mccoy, Nuart art glass, produced by Imperial Glass in Ohio, with production beginning in 1912. They'll find a good home here, the poor fixture will be hitting the road at some point (don't worry, I won't send it off dirty and naked)....

It's been a bit of a pity party around here. The surgery was far worse than I was expecting (who knew they'd hook you up to a ventilator for a one hour surgery), so I've been moping about, and forbidden from even picking up my kid let alone doing any work. You'd think I'd be appreciating the extra time to write, but apparently, not so much.

how d'ye do and shake hands

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Sun, 05 Jun 2016 15:08:00 +0000

Apparently our house is slow to warm up to people, as she only formally introduced herself to us yesterday.

I'd like to introduce you to Thornfield, the prickly sounding title of the home of John G. Kelly.

The irony is that the name was staring us in the face all along, as it's the name of this section of Edgewood on the plat books.

Thornfield, the Edgewood home of J.G. Kelly

Thornfield, the Edgewood home of John G. Kelly

So while we won't be renaming the blog, we will be relishing this rather magical development.

so much for the good year

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Thu, 26 May 2016 02:37:00 +0000

I was promised a good year. After the hell of 2015, and not so great previous years, this was to be the one we were waiting for. The kid was here, safe and sound. I was mostly recovered from the insanity of pregnancy/surgery/newborn, there was money in the bank to start the porch. The world was looking up.

Now, there has been stuff going on that isn't pertinent to the blog that has caused some setbacks to this goal, mostly financial, obviously. But when a gallbladder gone rogue makes me spend the last day of a conference mini vacation in the ER, things get personal. The pain was so sudden, and so crushing I was certain I was the Wicked Witch of the West and a house had been dropped on me. I have an appointment with a surgeon in two weeks, and while the thought of another attack is terrifying, so is the thought of another surgery and recovery (and hospital bills). At the moment, even if I felt well enough to climb a ladder to work, I'm too afraid to do so. And just mowing the lawn wipes me out, let alone entertaining a 7 month old all day.

To top things off, when we got home there were two violation notices waiting for us (that time of the year again). One being for having things on the side porch (well, duh, I do all my work there you idiots), and the especially aggravating one, for unsanitary yard conditions. The thing of it is, I had mowed, weeded, pruned and planted the day before the supposed inspection! If I had been a better blogger I'd have had pictures to prove it. But alas....

And to think that I had only gotten one week into painting season...

a very Pleasant Home

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 11:30:00 +0000

Ahhh, and here we arrive at my favorite of all. The mysteriously deserted 1897 Pleasant Home, designed by George Maher. Perhaps I'm just partial to the gratuitous use of light bulbs after hearing the story of Westinghouse supplying them for the 1893 Chicago World's fair (all 200,000 were shipped out from just below our house for weeks prior to the Fair). A house this theatrical should not feel quite so comfortable, and yet, it does... Incidentally, it was the only house free to tour, and yet, still empty. You'll notice that upstairs is not fully restored and being used at display space. IF I remember correctly, the historical society hopes to move out to another location if funds permit, and finish the restoration.

yes, the docent let me roll back the rugs. Three cheers for awesome people!

the original carriage house, long demolished

Luke, the adventure dog...

Frank's house

noreply@blogger.com (Mayfair Mistress) — Fri, 15 Apr 2016 11:30:00 +0000

So, it's not really a trip to Chicago without seeing at least one thing built by Frank Lloyd Wright, right? I find it strange that so much fabulousness is overlooked in the rush to pay homage to a man who valued design and ego over good engineering. But his home and studio, representing his early departure from the prevalent styles of the day, while still relying on it, is deeply appealing on many levels. The dark paint, and the home's lo slung Queen Anne profile just ooze a cozy House of Seven Gables charm. So photos.... I even paid the extra 5 dollars to take them legally, you're welcome!