Cornwall Homes - The Cornwall Armoury Building

Today's entry doesn't really count as a "Cornwall Home", but it's a rather significant local building that I want to highlight.

The Cornwall Armoury has always been a building in town that can't help but be noticed. It looks like a castle due to it's Tudor Revival style, and castellated peaks. There are also numerous Gothic details, such as the main doors, and carved accents.



You can read more about the building here, as well as see a few extra views (such as the rear): http://www.historicplaces.ca/en/rep-reg/place-lieu.aspx?id=11228



As a kid, I remember this place mainly as the home of the Sea Cadets and Air Cadets. For several years, my younger brother was in the Sea Cadets and trained here. In all the times I went (with Mom to go pick him up), I never actually went inside, other than by the back, into the large hall (which looked like a giant gymnasium).

Apparently the building has a nice museum collection of military artifacts, medals, and uniforms, as well as a library.









The doors are simply beautiful.

Cornwall Homes

I seem to have found a temporary (?) workaround to the problem I am having with Picasa.

This post will feature a follow-up to a house reno I've been following with you guys, as well as a handful of "pretty" Cornwall homes. I still have a large stock of fresh photos I took of other old homes, but I want to post them gradually.

About a week ago in this post, I posted a photo of the "Adams Sherwood Swabey & Fallon" lawyers' offices (reposted below), and I wanted to share with you guys a night shot. I don't have the best camera for night photography, but it's one of the best lit homes in town, and worth sharing.



It's a bit hard to make out, but if you look at the centre window over the main door, you'll see that each window is fitted with a custom shaped lit frame of small white lights. In addition, the house is lit with flood lights from below.



Next up is another of my favourite foursquares. This one sits on one of the main historic streets in town, and across from one of our high schools.

I especially like the robust columns, and porch railing (which you can see farther down), as well as the front door.



The following photos are more recent (the one above was taken in the summer). The house has an amazing side porch which is very hard to photograph because of a large lilac bush (on the left) and the fence. The screens were added later. Note the railing on the right.





Note the scroll appliqués on the door, the stained glass panels, and the original light fixture on the t-g ceiling.



This home (a few blocks away from the previous home) has some beautiful and unique Gothic details. The front doors are typical mid-to-late 19th century examples with deep mouldings. There is a very simple centre beam decoration over the central peak. The house has the original windows.



What really makes this house unique, however, is the Gothic detailing on the roof sides, and the original tin roof with dentil peak details (which I haven't seen on any other Cornwall homes).





Lastly, here's the reno house I mentioned. This is a house I've been following for quite some time (since it's on my street farther down, and part of my neighbourhood), but I haven't posted any updates to it in ages. In fact, the original photos I'm reposting are so old that they predate my switch to Picasa (back when I was still using Photobucket).

My first post about it was back in August 2011. For the longest time, it had been boarded up and abandoned, and in the past few years, they've been fixing it up. The following photo was taken shortly after the house had been opened-up again, and I noticed they were making repairs.



Fast forward a bit, and last fall, they had repaired and repainted about half the exterior. I took these shots a few weeks ago. I'm not thrilled with the new colours, but I don't hate them either. I'm ecstatic that this home is being saved. I'm also happy that it's being saved in a historically accurate way (rather than slapping-on some new siding). I assume that they're having the stained glass window repaired, since it was removed.



The roof still needs to be replaced (badly!) and the chimney needs repointing, but they're getting there! I *REALLY* should write them some kind of "you guys are awesome" letter/note.



They haven't done this side yet.

Cherry Bookcase Project (Part 4)

Alright, first off, if you're just joining me now, you can check out parts 1, 2, and 3 here:

http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/02/cherry-bookcase-project.html
http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/03/cherry-bookcase-project-part-2.html
http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/03/bookcase-update-another-oil-painting.html

Yesterday I left you guys with a bit of a teaser, and I'm not sure that too many of you have seen it yet, but too bad, since I'm doing the follow-up now. :P

On the last post, I had finished sanding the bottom case (the main bookcase part of the overall cabinet), installed the mouldings, and the bottom was basically done except for the shelves and back.

Since then, I went through what wood I had left, worked out some dimensions, and decided I should have just enough wood to build an upper glazed case (that's glazed as in glass doors, not frosted doughnuts) and I started building it.

I needed quite a bit of long pieces for all the mouldings, and horizontal stretchers, so I decided to use-up this cherry board that I picked up YEARS ago at a yard sale. It was a slightly warped and flawed board (crack down the centre), and not very wide. I had originally thought that I'd use it for a clock case, but antique clocks are RARELY ever made from cherry, so this project was as good a project as any to use it up.

Because of the extremely limited stock of cherry, the upper case isn't going to be all that useful for books. The interior case will only be about 7 5/8" wide on the exterior, leaving me with a shelf/interior of 6 1/2" (because of the back and the front frame taking up the other inch). Some books would definitely fit on 6 1/2" deep shelves, like novels, but I don't have that many of those. Most of my library consists of larger reference books. Instead, I'll likely use the upper case to display small clocks or collectibles.

The following photo shows the basic box for the upper case along with 6 scrap pieces of 1/4" cherry veneered panels. I could make a 6 panel back for the upper case, but I'm not sure whether or not it would look too busy.



Here you can see how I made the top of the case with a jigsaw puzzle of different boards. Why? Because I wanted the extra height. Parts of it are solid wood, and others are particle board (with cherry veneer). All are leftovers. I was also planning to do a matching string detail as the bottom case, so the harsh line between the different parts won't show.



Next, doors. With a constantly dwindling stock of old/new wood, each piece had to be measured and carefully picked. A few of the door frame pieces have screw holes (on the back or edges) that will mostly be hidden. They're held together with a simple butt-joint and dowels.



I always like to do a fair amount of research (since I'm so picky and I want to get the "most bang for my buck", or rather: effort in this case, since most of the stock was free). I wanted traditional looking glazed doors, but preferably without the multi-piece glass and complicated joinery. I've always loved Gothic pieces, and I don't own ANYTHING AT ALL with Gothic carvings or aesthetics, so since the base was pretty plain, I could do Gothic tracery in the upper doors without having it look "wrong" or mismatched. I went through 3-4 books (Antiques, Early American Furniture, Furniture of Old Quebec, etc) and copied several nice designs, and I also have a stock of nearly 150 internet photos of antique bookcases, so I had many options. In the end, I went with this pattern:



The top mouldings mainly came out of that yard sale board I mentioned earlier.



All 8 demi-arcs were taken out of the two upper panels from the previous side panel, and as a side note, the two bottom panels got turned into the sides for the upper case.

To make the segments, I used my drawing to make a pattern, and traced out the pieces. All the "grid" portions of the doors are 3/8" thick.



I won't even pretend that these doors were "easy" to make. They were assembled in a fairly simple manner, but they were still a total time-consuming pain in the ass to do.

All the grid pieces were cut to be 1/2 the door thickness (3/8 in this case, for a 3/4" thick door) and longer on the ends so that they extended 1/4" into the door frame (on the inside), to match-up with my 1/4" rabbet to hold the glass. It's hard to explain, but in photos that will be in "Part 5" you'll see this better.

All the joints for the grids are half lap joints. The notches are cut on the 1/4" ends, and matching notches are cut into the door frame edges. In the following photo, all 4 arcs have been notched and fitted on the upper points. "H" (the second arc) is also half-lapped over the top of "G" instead of being notched into the door frame. "G" continues into the frame, but "H" does not. Again, you can see this better later.

The pine horizontal bar is just a temporary one for measurements. With the 4 arcs in their places, I then traced a vertical line on each one. The interior door width is exactly 16" (which worked out beautifully). Divided into 4=4" You can see the 4" reference lines at the top.



4 arcs cut and sanded smooth along that edge.





Next, the 4 arc "pairs" were glued together along their long flat edges (using clothes pins and masking tape). Once glued, they were lightly sanded, and trimmed to length.

The centre bars were done next (and were done AFTER in case there was a bit of deviation in the arches L-R (in case they were slightly off centre from my 4" marks).

Note: nothing is glued yet. Those office clips worked out awesomely.



Next, the last pieces were the two bottom bars. These were cut to fit tightly, and push the arches up into their corners as much as possible (you want a snug fit, not one that's so tight it will deform/force things).

Again, half-lap joints were used. since I have 3 pieces coming together at the middle crosses, the middle joint was done with a diagonal cut (one on the top arch pieces, and one on the bottom bars).

I *COULD* have divided the 3/8" pieces all into 1/8 sections, and had all 3 pieces slot together, but it would have been a lot more work, and this was just as strong.



Yesterday's teaser photo:





At this point, the door grids were done and ready to glue, but I only glued them today. Also note that I haven't yet installed the upper bead detail, or sanded the putty on the crown. The doors and grids will also be routed to match the bottom doors. I'm also pondering adding a crest with 3 finials in a Hepplewhite-inspired style.

Knobs for the upper and lower doors will be hand-turned cherry ones, as will the finials (if I make some).