Victorian House Renovation in Bloomingdale, DC
Repointing, retucking, otherwise known as…its gonna cost you.
masonry is expensive. replacing historic mortar is even more expensive.the quick and dirty on historic mortar vs regular cement as I understand it: old bricks and mortar were manufactured differently than today. Old brick and mortar – breathe, expand and contract with the weather. New brick and mortar – don’t breathe, and don’t expand or contract. problems occur when old mixes with new.… Read the rest
One of the most interesting bits to hear would be about all the different workers and contractors that have come through the house. we have moved onto to getting mason quotes, because several weeks ago we discovered this:
On our side wall by the stairs. it didn’t look like that initially. first we saw squiggly lines. then the paint started bubbling, and it came off quite easily to reveal this. so we opened up our reference guides, and started making calls.… Read the rest
The VIB – probably feeling neglected – has been given us trouble lately, we have busted glass and crumbling mortar. But this post isn’t about that. its about success! ha, take that house gods. even though its not technically house. regardless, our roses are blooming!
after what looked like a fairly successful winter for them, we cleaned up and trained the bushes and they have really taken off. However, no sooner did the buds appear, myriad of squirrels did too!… Read the rest
It turned out that my efforts to save some money on reglazing process for the bathtub were mostly futile. Once the bathtub master arrived, he took one look at our scrapped up tub and very definitively said: Nope, not gonna work. Uff. But he did agree to accept a ‘side job’ of finishing scraping the tub and threw a sink reglazing in there as well – for $40. So that’s a savings of $25– not worth the time and health, but lesson learned (again) sometimes it’s just not worth it to DIY.… Read the rest
Nope, we aren’t building planes. Though that would be pretty sweet. Just sprucing up the upstairs bath (note the floor tiles, shower tiles, and sink – outdated).
Its almost been a year since we purchased a house and did a quick diy job on the bathtub. It wasn’t the greatest looking tub, but it was a big improvement and worked for the first 11 months, while we decided where on the list of priorities the bathroom is – turns out not very high.… Read the rest
with all the time i spend these days in thrift stores and flea markets, its obviously hard for me to resist picking up an extra good treasure when it surfaces. such as this one:
The National Geographic 1966 Map of Asia. $14, Ruff and Ready.
Sergey says that the water damage looks like the iron curtain from the cold war.
I love the map’s color pallet and its the perfect size for the wall.… Read the rest
Tissus Tartares. “a Eurasian aesthetic for a fabric house, one which would reflect the rich and sophisticated interplay between East and West as it is found in Russian, Persian and Central Asian designs.”
Source: WSJ Magazine (PS – I missed out on the print edition, if anyone has it please please if you are willing to part with it, I would be oh so happy!)
I have been slightly obsessed with Tissus Tartares since Olya Thompson’s brownstone was photographed for Vogue in January 2010.… Read the rest
hey, we should get at least some credit for even keeping up with the board. And even though most of the stuff isn’t completed we are making some progress on the VIB agenda. Like the patio door molding. I have actually spent some time on that last weekend, stripping paint from bottom pieces of the frame. I am going to call it right now – we actually finish in March.… Read the rest
How to train climbing roses for many, many blooms )… Read the rest
When and how to prune climbing roses.