Finishing touches (but no shower door)

Just a quick update, mostly on the decor front. I have oiled the soapstone counter; put out the hand towel holder made from a vintage lamp (found on Etsy); and filled the empty wall space between the vanity and window with an old apple picking ladder I found at a local antique shop. The ladder was bare wood mixed with faded red paint when we found it, so I dry brushed it with leftover flat white ceiling paint. Some of the wood still shows through but it is definitely a better match now for the rest of the room. We have the hardware for the pocket doors but it has not yet been installed. Thanks to my parents for the excellent towels and bath mats!

Oiled soapstone and hand towel holder

Ladder means plenty of room to hang extra towels

New curtains are semi-sheer with a faint stripe, heavy enough for privacy (and made in the USA)

Love this train rack over the tub

Double towel rack next to shower. We chose black and white towels for this room, but just black towels for the boys.

When the door comes, the glass will be lightly frosted (in white).

View from hallway

Because we changed the size of the the WC, the window had to be switched out for a smaller one. This necessitated replacing some of the siding on the exterior of the house as well. Earlier this week they started this work and found a bit of a surprise (though in hindsight it does make sense symmetrically):

Here you can see the original wood siding (yellow) and a hidden window!

This window on the right was apparently covered up in a previous renovation, probably by the 2nd owners. It's filled with insulation. We had no idea it was there! It will be covered by a board before the siding goes back up.

 As our siding is quite old, they could not find an exact match; when the weather warms up a bit a coat of paint should blend it in quite well.

So to be 100% finished we still need:

--steam shower door in master bath
--pocket door hardware installed
--soapstone backsplash in powder room
--siding painted

Thanks for reading!

Details large and small

While the master steam shower doors are still not in yet, lots of other details large and small are being attended to. Powder room is just waiting on a marble backsplash (made from a remnant of the old master bath countertop---just about the only section that didn't have a crack on the underside!); boys bathroom still needs an adjustment on the glass shower door, but is essentially complete.

As usual, I have photos---please excuse any construction stuff in the background and I also apologize for the ever-present layer of dust.

The AC return was moved from in front of the powder room door to the side here

New floorboards, I may put a small rug here

We changed the door swing out into the hallway because of tub placement, seems to work just fine

New soaking tub

A good combination of modern and vintage lines

A train rack will go on this wall to hold towels and my robe

Nice hand-held shower. That button just below it opens AND closes the drain stopper

Closet hallway with new pocket door separating from master bedroom

Soapstone counters from Bucks County, mirrors are cabinets

New sinks and cross handle faucets

Water closet, also with pocket door

Lower half hold steam generator for shower, upper half for storage

Toilet and new window (smaller than the old one)

So that's where we are in the master bath---pretty close to the end! Hopefully in the next week or so I will have final pictures for you-----but don't hold me to it!

Thanks for reading!

Peacock Feathers and Calypso Blue

Greetings and Happy New Year! Sorry it has been awhile, but I have some good photos and a lot of progress to share.

The boys' bathroom is 99% complete---the Cambrian Black counter tops will be installed later this week and then all will be complete! We finally got our awesome 3 foot Kohler Brockway sink and cabinet delivered and it looks as great as I hoped it would. (Sorry about the bad lighting in these photos but I think you get the idea):

You can also see our new built-in cupboard in the mirror; there are about 5 or 5 pullout drawers in there.

The faucets come with the sink and are a mixture of stainless and chrome finishes; all other fixtures and knobs are chrome.

Now two can brush teeth at the same time!

The master has progressed much quicker than we expected, given the size of the room and the fact that it was a total gut job. Bathtub and toilet need to be installed and we are waiting on the glass doors for the steam shower. There are, as usual, other little detail jobs that also need to be completed, but those are the big ones.

Kind of hard to see but these are the new linen closets; used to be open shelves. Now the left side is for hanging clothes and the right side has adjustable shelves. Upper portion is just a big open cabinet for comforters, etc.

Revealed chimney. Cabinets were built by Amish craftsmen who don't use electricity or telephones (except 30 minutes per day!). They even needed a driver bring them and the cabinets on installation day!

The mirrors next to the chimney are actually medicine cabinets! The color on the top of the wall is Benjamin Moore Peacock Feathers; cabinet is Calypso Blue. I don't remember the color on the bottom part of the wall---oops.

With all the color on the walls we kept it simple in the shower---white subway tile, a black hex border on the floor (there are black hex triangles scattered on the main floor, sorry they are not visible), and soapstone on the bench and shower entry.

Large shower head; you can also see the controls for the steam shower lower left. Also jets in the middle.

Another view-- near the floor you can see where the steam will come out.

Hopefully I'll have more to post soon---thanks for reading!

More demolition!

They're really moving on the master bathroom demolition! With all the walls down, you can really see how big the room is. We did run into a potential problem, though.

bathtub still in place, buckets covering where toilet used to be

steam shower will go where tub is now, door is to hallway

new built-in closet where toilet is now stored, pocket door will be installed where plastic sheeting hangs between bathroom and bedroom

where storage cabinet used to be

window in what used to be the WC

chimney that is the source of our problem (storage cabinet space on left, WC window on right)

This chimney has been hidden behind a wall. We wanted to expose it as we did in our kitchen. It is a nice decorative element and removing the built out wall gives us more space. However, we thought the chimney was situated closer to the window. The original plan was to build the new WC wall with the chimney visible from both the WC and the main bathroom. The double sink vanity would have extended from the side of the chimney along where the storage cabinet used to be (though leaving about 18-24" for a smaller storage closet next to the front window).

Now that the chimney is more centered in the room, it really shoves the double vanity right up to the window and makes the room look lopsided. Putting one single vanity on either side will not work because of the window shown above--there is not enough room. So our only option at this point is to make room by replacing the current window with a much smaller window (which will still be in the WC) and gain more wall space on that side of the chimney. Then we can put a sink on either side.

It will be more complicated since it involves work on the exterior of the house, but I think it will be worth it in the end. We are still thinking about other options, and may very well come up with something else that works. As usual, you never know what will happen with an old house!

You Can't Stop Progress!

So I haven't been very good at the blogging this time around--sorry! But rest assured some progress HAS been made. We currently have 3 usable toilets, 2 functioning bathtub/showers, and 4 working sinks! However, that is all about to change as demo on the master bath has begun, and that means we will soon be down 1 toilet, 1 tub, and 2 sinks.

By no means does this mean that we have completed bathrooms, either. The powder room door finally has a new lock, but needs a coat of paint; the floor in there needs a threshold; and the AC return in the floor (right in the doorway) still needs to be moved.

In the boys' bathroom, we still need shower doors (which have been ordered and should be here soon); a storage cabinet; and the sink and vanity--I know I said we had a sink, but it is on loan from the contractor just so we can wash our hands!

Both rooms still need the lighting fixtures installed--the bare bulb look, while reminiscent of my favorite Broadway show "Rent", doesn't fly here.

A small problem I didn't really consider: shades of white. There are about a gazillion and I think I have at least half of them in my house. Redoing these bathrooms in true black and white means that my trim whites elsewhere in the house won't match. While they look white enough on their own, in these new rooms they ranged anywhere from slightly creamy to downright yellow. In both the PR and the BB, this means that we had to get creative when it came to the doors and jambs. The inside of the door and inner half of the jamb is bathroom white, and the outside of the door and outer half of the jamb is hallway white. There was no other way to handle it besides repainting all of the trim on the house to match the bathrooms! No thanks.

Some photos:

this area used to be part of a closet

now my new bathtub will be here

door back on powder room with new (antique-style) lock

door open

i love the tile at the base

new mirror

new window

new shower head, love the tile work

waiting on glass sliding door

temporary sink, recessed medicine cabinet

So I think we only have a few more days in the master bathroom, then we will all be sharing the boys bathroom. I think we'll have to make a schedule because it could get crowded in there!

Tile, tile, and more tile

Sorry so long since the last update. I took these pictures about a week ago, so more has been accomplished since then, but this will give a pretty good representation of where we are in the process. Things are moving along, and should be at a faster clip now that most of our supplies are finally here, and also since 95% of the tile work on the PR and the BB is complete. There is still grouting to be done, but I think the hard part is past us.

Floor of powder room--the tile came in a black and white every other pattern, but it was too much for me so I came up with this with some help from the guys. I wanted to make it easy so they just had to pop out some black tiles and replace with white ones as opposed to moving black ones AND white ones all over the place.

This is the new sink, though not in its final position.

Boys bath, more tiling completed including the black tile base. The toilet works!

Inside of tub shower

Opposite wall of tub

I really like that we tiled the front of the tub! The top where it is now dark gray will have the same black tile used vertically on the wall.


Hopefully I will have more news this weekend. Please have a safe and happy Labor Day!