Anyone who knows me will say I belong in the past. Victorian style and even more recent eras like the 1950s captivate me with their color, patterns, and decorative detail. For more than thirty years I designed rooms for myself that would have felt comfortable to the Vanderbilts and the Carnegies. A Victorian in Redwood City, followed by another near Chico, California, gave me the canvas to play out all my deepest Gilded Age decorating urges.
It’s a little ironic that I should end up, in retirement, with my husband Larry, in a high-rise condominium complex that was built in the 1980s (and hasn’t been remodeled since). Our health no longer lets us live where we want, so a few years after moving here we decided to bring a little bit of that old-time magic to three rooms: the living room, solarium, and galley kitchen.
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Esta historia es de la edición July - August 2024 de Old House Journal.
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Navigating the Lumberyard - Here's some lumber lingo you should know before you venture into a lumberyard.
Here's some lumber lingo you should know before you venture into a lumberyard. Almost everyone fixing an old house will end up at a lumberyard-whether it's a local supplier or the organized aisles of a big-box home-improvement store.
a farmhouse renewed
Sensitive renovations and restoration work preserved a house that dates to 1799.
AN OVERVIEW OF METAL ROOFING
METAL ROOFS ARE RESURGENT, FOR GOOD REASONS.
ENDURING BEAUTY IN WALLS of STONE
Now back in the family who had been here since 1830, the old farmhouse is again ready for generations to come. Additions dating to 1840 and the 1950s were preserved.
ARCHITECTURAL DETAILS COME TO LIFE
Owners and their designer celebrate the unique features of a 1912 Arts & Crafts Tudor.
For a Wet Basement Wall
If there's problem common to old houses, it's a wet basement. I'm not talking about occasional flooding, but rather a basement that apparently seeps or leaks after even a rain shower or during snowmelt. Several approaches are available; sustainable solutions will get to the root of the problem.
Patching a Plaster Wall
Fix a hole in the wall with a few common tools and some drywall supplies. Practice your technique!
Roofing & Siding
Make note of these historical and unusual materials for the building envelope.
The Riddle of the water
When water incursion happens, the roof isn't necessarily the culprit. Maybe snaking a drain line, or clearing debris from a clogged gutter, temporarily will stem a leak. But a recurring problem usually means other forces are at work. It takes persistence-and a team with the right skills and patience—to identify the source and apply a solution.
Light-filled Craftsman Redo
For a dark kitchen in a 1914 Illinois house, the trick was anchoring white expanses with woodsy warmth.
