Cornwall Homes

In this installment of Cornwall Homes, I have mainly 2 homes to discuss. The first is Hart House. This is a large historic house near downtown. I don't know the build date, but I would guess around 1870-1880. It has been converted to commercial use, and I believe it is currently in use by lawyers' offices. To the back and right of the building is a large addition that is very much in the style of the 1930s or 40s.

Recently (over the past 2 years or so), the building has been undergoing many renovations and upgrades. Some good, some not so good. Overall I'm happy that the building is being well maintained, but some of the changes have drastically altered some of the historic details and charm of the building. The first major change was the replacing of all the original wooden windows.

I noticed this when there was only ONE original window left in place. I don't really have any additional photos of the building before the changes. I might, but it would mean hours of searching through old files on my other computer or on CD backups.





You can see that the large bottom windows had a rather unique design which was not at all copied in the replacements. By far the most annoying change for me is the loss of the curved tops. Seeing squared tops in arched openings is always a sad sight. They did keep the original wooden panels in the bottom windows.

At the same time, the cornices and mouldings were freshly painted in white (which was badly needed). You can tell in the bricks that there might have been a porch on this side long ago.

This was taken a bit later. Note the painted panels on the left windows.



This is the addition. It has a really beautiful little porch (unfortunately with a brand new door slapped in there).



More recently however, this happened, and I'm really NOT happy about it. While the old porch was not in the best shape, and it may not have been original to the house either (you can see outlines of a two-storey porch in the brickwork), I hate the look of this porch. Too square, too bulky, and what are those awful angled corner beams. This looks like it belongs on a log house. There is absolutely nothing elegant about this porch.





Next is a large duplex down the street from me on Cumberland. This place is a bit interesting because it was bought by someone I kind of know. For years it was a florist, and I can't remember what it was before that. The person who had bought it a few years ago is a lady who knows my boss, and her husband. The husband is a doctor (physiotherapist I think) and they wanted to fix up the place to live above, and have his practice and office on the main floor. When she said she was hoping to have the place ready in about 2-3 months I knew that was not going to work out.

They started working on it, and eventually it needed too many renovations and they sold it. Grant Marion (a local construction firm) bought it and flipped it. They did a fairly good job as far as I could see from the exterior, and it now has new owners.

Here was the house after the florist business closed down and the place went for sale. The random shutters and cement porch replacement were by far the most offensive changes to the building.





This was months lather after the lady and her husband had worked on it for a while. The cement landing was removed, and several of the old and previously replaced windows were changed.





This was after Marion took over the project.



Most of the windows (not all of them) were upgraded to this 6 over 1 pattern. I don't think it's historic, but I actually prefer these. They help to add a bit of detail to an otherwise plain brick building. Note the rear window.



Lastly, here's the finished house with new owners. You can see that they shortened that back window (presumably for the kitchen), they rebuilt a plain new porch following close to the original outlines in the brick, and they installed a large black metal deck at the rear, which I should photograph at some point. Overall a pretty nice job. I think the only thing I'd like to see changed is to brick-up that air conditioner hole that was turned into a small window.



The last little bonus I wanted to post is to show the new apartment building that replaced the Rosemirlea apartments that burned down a few years ago. I consider this building to be a complete eye sore. I can't understand why they chose to have the parking lot right at the front like this.

You can read about the tragic Rosemirlea fire here: http://my1923foursquare.blogspot.ca/2013/06/tragic-fire-at-rosemirlea-apartments.html

Victorian Farmhouse - Part 21 Laundry Room / Bathroom

This is some of the progress that's been done on the section just off from the kitchen. I haven't shown photos of this area in quite a while, because we didn't know what we wanted to do with the space yet. Angie decided that since we have opened up the original stairs into the basement, we could block-off the old cement stairs off from the kitchen. This gave the option of converting what used to be two very small rooms with a low ceiling, into a nice sized room with a taller ceiling, and 2 windows. The extra door was blocked off, and the old exterior door (which is only about 5 feet high) will be replaced also.

Here's some of the transformation of that area of the house. But just before I start, I'll show a floor plan to clarify (and in case some readers aren't too sure). The area we're talking about is rooms 1 and 2. The dividing wall was already removed in all of these photos.



This is looking through the exterior door into room "3" on the plan.



Looking into the kitchen from room 2:



Room 1, looking into the kitchen. Note the exterior siding and door trim. This was probably an exterior porch at one point.



This shows almost all of room 1. The window opening is the original Victorian house, and it looks into the living room. That old red tongue-and-groove cabinet used to sit on the right side platform, and the door to the basement is directly below this platform, and in line with the window (roughly).



You can KIND of see some light in the opening of the basement door.



The two side windows:



This is from outside, looking through room 3, and into rooms 2 and 1. This room 3 is not on a foundation (just in the dirt) and it has sunk a bit. The plan was to demo this room and have a small corner porch here. You can see that the floor of room 2 is a poured concrete floor.



Inside room 3, you can see how short this door is, and there's a pretty steep step down. Also more exterior siding on this. The wall on the right is the attached barn, and there's a door on this side that leads into the barn.



The door into the barn is the sort of lighter green on the bottom right. You can see the exterior siding on the exterior of room 2.



More angles from inside room 3. Yes that light fixture is an old desk lamp. It was connected by 2 or 3 long extension cords all the way into the garage (not safe).





Here you can see the cement floor, and some old newspapers shoved into cracks as insulation. These are from a "Family Herald Weekly" and I think aother Montreal newspaper, and they date to the 1920s if I remember correctly. Look at the ad for the old stove (or heater?)!



This shows the old low roof removed, with the new roof exposed.





Some of the mess.



New ceiling being framed out.



More mess.



This is possibly the BEST "Fail!" photo I've ever taken. At some point someone drilled a hole into the exterior wall as a drain for the washing machine. They drilled this hole in the EXACT centre of a load bearing 2x4 stud.



I don't remember if this was already broken, but it's broken now.



I shared a similar photo in the last post. This was the kind of mess that Pierre and I would clean up daily to save some work time for the uncles.



Before the new floor went in, we discovered a sort of trap door in the concrete floor of the laundry room (room 2). As it turns out, that entire side is basically a hollow concrete cube. It had no access hole other than the trap door (which I believe was nailed or glued shut), and it had nothing in it except a hole in the floor in one corner. It looked really creepy like a dungeon room. I wish I had taken photos, but I didn't think of it, and before I knew it, it was too late. New 2x6 floor beams were installed on the room 1 side, and plywood was installed across both rooms.









Pierre was happy to see some progress.



Drywall, plumbing, and electrical. Unfortunately, some of the plumbing is not exactly where they wanted it, and the plugs are in REALLY STUPID locations, like RIGHT next to the window, even though the window casings will be almost 5" wide.



Not sure why the water intake for the toilet is coming out of the floor, instead of the wall (laziness).



This gives you a much better idea of how short that door really is.



That's as far as things progressed for that room for now.

Victorian Farmhouse - Introduction

With my friends' permission, I'll be posting occasional updates on the renovation of their Victorian Farmhouse.

As I mentioned earlier, my friends have been looking to buy a house for a while. They had tried to buy a home a few months back closer to Ottawa (where they currently live), but the deal fell through. All the houses they've looked at have been either priced too high, or in poor shape. In the meantime, they've had this old farmhouse on the back burner and they weren't quite sure if they could do much with it, or how much it might cost to make it livable again. The farmhouse is also not exactly in an ideal location for them unless my one friend leaves her job, so they've been thinking about it on and off for a while. There are definitely a lot of pros and cons with this house, but I think after all the enthusiasm I showed for the place, they've decided to see if they can fix it up.

My friend had actually shown me some photos of the house on her phone months ago, but at the time, it didn't look too exciting. It wasn't until I actually visited the house in person that I really saw the potential in it.

Here's the rough scoop on the situation: the house is basically theirs if they want it. As in... FREE (minus all the renovation costs). The house, I believe, was her aunt's place (not 100% sure of this), and no one has been living in it for over 3 years, other than a few cats. Originally there was a bunch of disputes and reluctance about giving her the house because they didn't quite know how much renovating and modifications she wanted to make to the house. My friend is actually quite a bit like me (she loves old homes and she worked for many years at Upper Canada Village), so she didn't want to ruin the house, but rather save it and make it livable again, since it was already badly in need of repairs and maintenance. I assume that things were discussed and that everyone is okay with everything now.

I was told right off the bat (months ago) that if I visited, the house definitely smelled like cat pee. Lovely. When I actually did see it, however, it really wasn't that bad. Apparently there was awful shag carpeting everywhere that my friends had already taken out, as well as several layers of old linoleum. With all that out of the way, the bulk of the smell went away.

Without any further babble, let me start adding some photos. Here is the main farmhouse in all it's glory.



Attached to the rear is a rather dilapidated old barn. I'm not exactly sure when this was added, but the barn actually looks older than the house.



Now I know what some of you might be thinking: Yikes! And I wouldn't blame you too much for thinking this. I think all of us are thinking this to varying degrees.

One of the first things we're doing (other than removing all the added junky renovations) is to cut down all the trees, bushes, and vines that are growing against the house.

A few more quick notes before I move on. That back barn half is partially on a foundation. The rest (the back portion with the 2 garage doors) is sitting in the ground and sinking slowly. This barn is all made from hand hewn (enormous) log beams. The second floor is largely held up by just a few 20 foot long horizontal beams with no centre supports. It's kind of incredible, but also kind of terrifying. All the corner joints are notched and pegged together (very old construction). I really think that this whole back part is 2 separate additions, HOWEVER, from the inside, the roof seems continuous. I'll show photos farther down.

Anyhow, the back part of this that's sitting on a foundation is the kitchen (with the 3 part window and a door on the right).

Before things get confusing, here's a quick and rough floor plan of the farmhouse.



Notes on the floor plan:

The main road runs parallel to the front porch. The peaked gable is on the left side of the house.
Kitchen: The kitchen is in the barn addition, and as a result it is sunk down about a foot lower than the main farmhouse. It also has a bit of a low ceiling.
1. This section is part of the house that's on the cement foundation (the main farmhouse has a stone foundation). These are the steps that lead down into the farmhouse's stone foundation.
2. This section is NOT on a foundation, and it leads into a back (unfinished) section of the attached barn.
Living Room: The living room had a side door (facing the peaked gable and leading onto the deck) and we plan to install a main door here again. The house has no fireplaces, but there's a huge old grate from a wood furnace in the ceiling. Oddly enough, there is no additional floor protection where the stove would have sat (stone, or sheet metal, etc).
Office: This was likely the original parlor or library room of the house. The dotted line shows the place where an original archway was sealed-up in the 1920s (we've opened this up again already - pictures in the next post). We're not sure if the current archway was there, however, since the mouldings on it don't match, and neither does the flooring.
3. and 4. in the small bedroom are some built-in closets that make the room feel even smaller. I'm not sure if we're removing these yet, but there's a good chance we are. This room still has the old carpeting.
5. Closet in the pink master bedroom (plank door).
6. These two thin lines represent the sloped ceilings.
Bathroom: The bathroom is teeny tiny, maybe 6 feet square.

Alright, on to the house tour. Keep in mind that this house has had many renovations over the years, and that the little old lady was VERY fond of wallpaper.

Kitchen:
The kitchen will probably be the most challenging room to work out. This entire room sits on a foundation that might not have been built/poured correctly, and I have no idea what the plumbing or electrical is going to be like in this room. This addition is very old (the construction is all old barn wood) and it has had a few alterations already. The current door (the metal door leading onto the deck) is VERY crooked, and there are visible air gaps where you can see outside at the top. The room currently only has the one window, plus the windows of the side lights of the main door. The current plan is to gut the room and close-up that door to replace it with a window instead. The main door would then be switched back for the old location in the living room (leading onto the deck).

Despite all the problems with this room, it's a huge room with a lot of potential! There is definitely enough room to do an island, and there's room for half of it to be a dining room as well.



The sink is currently in a terrible location. Also note the drop in floor height.





Living Room:
The living room has the most character and a really wonderful atmosphere. It is the best lit room in the house, with 3 windows. The issues in this room include a really big hump (or two) in the floor, and some ugly HVAC and plumbing bump-outs in the walls. The main electrical panel is also in a really awful place right in the "V" corner between the kitchen and deck. I don't have a good photo of it (until later on). The current plan is to see if the main electrical panel can be relocated in the basement below, or into the kitchen side.

This room features an original tongue-and-groove ceiling, and wainscoting. All of the old farmhouse also has its original old windows. The current plan is to fix them (they're in fairly good shape).

The other issue is all the wallpaper. There are at least 4 layers of wallpaper over the original rough plaster. We've removed 80% of it so far.





This is pointing towards the deck side. The main door will eventually be the opening on the right with the roller shade in it. Also note all the plant hooks in the ceiling. I think I must have removed about 10 of them.





The original mouldings in this room all match this profile except the archway into the office room.



The office room archway has this profile:



Here are some of the wallpaper layers. There's a stripe, the green damask, and a blue and grey bouquet pattern. On top of all this was also another pink and beige floral, which you can see in the photos above. The green damask is actually kind of nice (it has a metallic look) but I think it would have looked quite dark in the whole room.





I didn't get too many good shots of the office room. It's a rather small room, maybe 10' x 10', and this wall shows the outline of the original archway and mouldings, which would open up into the main hall with the staircase. The room has 2 windows. One looks on to the front of the house (main road), and the other faces the right side of the house.



This is from the office, facing into the living room, with the kitchen doorway just visible. The built-in bookcase in the living room used to be a window at one point. This room was also covered in wallpaper, but my friends had already removed it, and it had come off easily. The blocked archway is just to the left.



The front rooms of the house all use rosettes (including the windows of the office) but this pair don't match all the others. They are, however, old enough to have been installed with square nails, so they've been there a very long time. Also note that the casings match the profile on the opposite side (photo above).



Main Hall & Staircase:
By far the prettiest feature in this entire house is the Victorian Staircase. I don't really know the age of the house, but it's old enough that it didn't originally have electricity, plumbing, a kitchen, or a decent heating system (wood stove). It sits on a stone foundation, and I assume the only source of light would have been candles and oil lamps. I believe the electrical system only dates to about the 1950s or 60s.

In this photo you can see the front door, which leads into a later porch (small with a low ceiling). The original archway into the office/parlor would have been on the left wall. Some ultra sexy features of the room include acoustic ceiling tiles, and 1/8" plywood on the walls, covered in wallpaper. The thin (later) mouldings at the ceiling and covering the plywood seams are all in baby blue plastic/PVC.



You can see, however, that the hall still has all the original mouldings, with casings that match the ones in the living room, except that they use rosettes instead of mitered corners. The rosettes are 5 1/4" square, and 1 1/4" thick! The original casings are 7/8" thick. Not exactly something you can still find at your local lumber yard.



The staircase is WONDERFUL. It does, however, need work. The banister is very loose, as are all the spindles. Aside from that, it's in great shape!





You can see the edge of the plywood next to the rosette.



Every single spindle on the staircase is hand turned, and very much "eye balled". None are exactly consistent, and I absolutely adore this.



The main problems with the main hall are largely cosmetic except for a huge buckle in the floor at the base of the steps. I'm talking like 2-3". It's practically a small hill. We'll be checking this next time I go over. We might be able to pull it down.

Second Floor

Landing:
Here's the second floor landing at the top of the staircase. The upstairs has only 2 rooms plus the tiny bathroom and landing. This window is the one in the gable peak on the side of the house. To the immediate left is the master bedroom, behind me is the small bedroom, and to the right is the bathroom.





There's a section of the Ottawa Farm Journal stuck to the floor at the top of the stairs with the date October 30 1925.



Bathroom:
The bathroom is roughly 7' square. It's teeny tiny. There's only enough space for the toilet, vanity, and bath. Lavender anyone?





Small Bedroom:
I guess the small bedroom would be the guest bedroom or spare bedroom. I believe she said her grandfather occupied this room. It currently has some pretty atrocious decor. Wallpaper, wood grained paneling, and a green shag carpet. It is currently still filled with old furniture. There are 2 rather large and bulky closets in the room.





The original doors upstairs were a rather lovely 3-over-3 style with rim locks. One of the locks is intact, and the other is missing. Two of the three doors are still original (the bathroom door is newer). I might see if we can find a matching old door for the bathroom. The closet doors (in the living room and master bedroom seem to have always been just plank doors).



Master Bedroom:
This room is a great size, and it has 2 bright windows overlooking the main road (front of the house). The room has had drywall added over the plaster. I'm not sure if we're leaving this alone. or removing it. At least one section will need to be patched (old roof leak).



I'm not exactly sure what ran through here. I assumed it was from a stovepipe, but below this is the main hall, and there was no corresponding hole found under the acoustic tiles. We plan to patch this, and the original pine floors will be repainted and kept.



Plank door to the master bedroom closet, with beautiful Victorian hardware.



Master bedroom main door, looking through the landing and into the bathroom. Note the electrical light switch is currently set up over the drywall, and on the wrong side of the door. This is the door with the missing rimlock set. It still has the catch, and keyhole escutcheon, but the mechanism is missing. We actually found one in the old detached barn, but it's missing parts, and VERY rusty.





Barn:
Here is the attached barn addition. This is what's directly over the kitchen! It looks like it used to have an exterior wall that ended where that chimney is (fitted for a wood stove), but the rest of the roof seems continuous over the length of the whole building. There's a single window behind me to the left. If you go back to the top of the post, you can see where this chimney pokes through the roof in the second photo.



Just forward of this (with a lower floor) is the really saggy back portion of the barn. The entire floor curves down in the middle by several inches. This part of the barn is in no way weatherproofed aside from the roof. The far wall has gaps where you can see outside. There are also weak floor boards and holes, so you have to be very careful where you walk!



The stairs leading up/down into the barn are up against the back part of the kitchen (on a foundation), and it looks like it has traditional exterior wood siding.



My friends would love to level this back part of the barn, and seal it up to make it usable, but we have no idea how much that would cost. It's a huge building, and it would need a proper foundation, as well as additional bracing and supports to level everything out. For now we're focusing on the main house.