Projects: Main House
Here we list many of the renovation projects we will be undertaking in the next five years or so. As we do these projects, we are developing a longer-term restoration plan. We have a good idea about aspects of the restoration plan, but are waiting to review Gill’s plans for this house. As we review those plans, we will update our blog about our future restoration activities.
The Main House
Great Room: The great room is the most spectacular room in the house, but it is in need of paint and flooring and, in general, a craftsman design concept. Certainly this will include restoring the banister to the original plan. We would also like to expose the pine floor beneath the carpet, though in the south east corner there is an area about five feet square that is plywood. When the house was abandoned, local kids jumped off the balcony onto a mattress on the floor below and, in so doing, they destroyed the flooring.
Kitchen: The kitchen needs a face lift, it needs to be period-sensitive and functional. The kitchen will have better function, including good ventilation, and will allow us plenty of space to can our summer vegetable bounty. It will be designed with nooks for culturing and fermenting foods, both to preserve our foods and to add to the vitamin and enzyme content. Aesthetically, the kitchen will have a period feel with craftsman elements and with modern time-saving conveniences. You can read more detailed plans for our kitchen remodel in our blog.
Bathrooms: The main house has 5 bathrooms. Though they all need remodeling rather desperately, we will focus on 2 or 3 in the short term. Originally, the bathrooms had redwood bathtubs. We know this fact because some years ago my parents were told that a local cattleman was using one of the tubs to water his cattle. All of the bathroom fixtures were stripped in the 1940s. But in the 1950s the house was remodeled by Harry Binns (who branded “HB” into the balusters in the great room), a plumber by trade. He used some very interesting fixtures in his remodel that he probably salvaged from his own projects at the time. We intend to keep them in our own remodel. One bathroom has a set of blue bathroom fixtures; another has an art deco set in good condition. We should be able to remodel three bathrooms using fixtures that are already here. Not all of the fixtures are from the 1910s, but they are all rather old and interesting in themselves. You can read more detailed plans for our bathroom remodel in our blog.
View Room Wall. One of the three porches that was enclosed, the View Room, has a rotten wall. The cause of the rot is a drainage problem, a window installation problem, or a combination of both. It is an open question when or how this wall will be replaced. There is some disagreement in the household over opening this porch back up. In the meantime, we’ll improve the drainage from the roof and keep discussing the fate of this room.
Heating: Our only source of heat in the winter is wood stoves. The house is heated by three strategically-placed stoves in the main house. We make no effort to heat the entire house and certainly do not find that to be a realistic goal. However, we would like to reduce our reliance on wood heat since it does reduce the air quality in the house. Part of our plan needs to be to conserve the heat that we are generating. There are areas that need to be weather-proofed and storm windows added. But we would also like to investigate alternative sources of heat for key rooms in the house.
Air flow: Gill designed this home to have exceptional air flow but sometime in its history, a number of north-south doors were enclosed which cut off the possibility of north-south ventilation across the house. The air here in California Hot Springs is one of the key reasons we are living here and we need to maximize our exposure to it. To do so, we will re-open the doors that were enclosed to provide for better overall ventilation.
Dry rot on exterior beams. The outlook beams on the north and south sides have a good bit of dry rot. These beams are scheduled to be repaired by the fall of 2005 with some sort of splicing technique. Our engineer says that they would last another winter or two before becoming a structural concern. We all say the sooner the better.