We are officially into our fourth week of demolition and the crew is nearly complete with the deconstruction, or “demolition by hand” process. Five men have manually stripped practically the entire house piece by piece, salvaging as many of the materials inside as possible. We are reusing as much of the lumber, beams, doors, windows and trim as we can.
Since our intent is to preserve rather than replace, everything is done manually and this process takes longer than a typical sledgehammer demolition.
As mentioned in a post before, Josh removed all of the doors and mantles prior to the demo beginning. An electrician then came and removed all of the light fixtures. The demolition crew has worked on the cabinets, sinks, tubs, trim, removing old insulation, ceilings, and interior and exterior walls to allow for insulation, plumbing, HVAC and electricity.
A few things uncovered since mid-September include:
- Several areas of rotten wood
- Evidence of a significant house fire many years ago on the second floor and attic (Would love to hear more about this if any locals have heard stories!)
- A window (not a stained) was broken during the process
- Five fireplace tiles were accidently tossed
- Support issues were found on both sides of the front of the house
- A gaping hole is currently the floor of a future bathroom
- Lack of support in the future breakfast nook
These are all things that our general contractor and framing subcontractor are aware of and have a plan for (and all issues we pretty much expected to have).
Even though the demolition process can seem overwhelming and stressful at times, there have been several good surprises come from this adventure!
We discovered the opportunity to have exposed, original brick in the downstairs family room and one of the bedrooms upstairs:
Uncovered the possibility of having a vaulted ceiling in the future upstairs hallway bathroom:
Exposed a significant attic space that we were unaware of:
Visualized the potential for a possible expansion of the downstairs bathroom:
So that’s where we are–enjoying the process and taking lots of photos!
Check back with us as we wrap up the demo portion of our project and get started on the fun stuff! We are also adding stories and photos to our Instagram account.