As another week passes, our project starts looking more and more like a house again. This week, we’ve made more substantial progress on finish millwork, HVAC, tile work, and structural work.

At the beginning of the week, our carpenters delivered our interior doors to the building. There are a number of original doors that we have attempted to save, but many required too much restoration for the benefits to be worthwhile. The doors we did save, included beautiful pocket doors (which suffered some damage during the demo process) and three original doors with stained glass inserts. I’ll share some photos of those doors once we get them out of storage and start getting them restored. The doors we did order for our project are solid core unfinished doors. Over the course of the week, our carpenter installed interior doors in both apartments, and continued to work on the finish millwork.

Midweek, we also had our carpenter rip up the old carpet from the main stairwell, so that we could gauge the condition of the woodwork underneath. Luckily, the carpet has seemed to protect the stairs from decades of wear. The carpet itself left many tiny nails / staples that have to be pulled one by one, but once those are removed, our floor guy will sand, stain and poly the stairs back to their formal glory.

Also this week, our tile guy came back through to start water proof lining the basement showers to prep for the upcoming tile work. While on site, he also went back to the 2nd floor bathrooms to install the final finish grout and apply a sealer which should protect the grout and tiles from soap scum and other oily substances from the typical shower products.

Over the weekend, Andrea and I purchased most of the light fixtures for the 2nd floor unit and for one day during this week, our electrician sent out one technician to install them. We went with some basic fixtures in the bedrooms, office and living room. We picked out a ceiling fan for the sun-room, some pendant lights over the future island, and a flashier fixture in the entryway.

Finally, our metal contractor has arrived to start building out the exterior back stairwell and balconies. Our contractor pre-fabricated many of the pieces used for the structure back in his shop. He then delivered the material to our project site and welded them together to create the structure. By the end of the week, the main structural members were installed and at least one protective coat of paint has been applied.

BSMT media room window trim installed

Iron supports and balcony structure going up

Interior doors delivered to site

2nd Floor lighting fixtures going in

2nd Floor ceiling fan in the sun room

Carpet ripped up from main stairwell

2nd Floor furnace going in

BSMT masterbath shower getting prepped for tile

2nd Floor Hall bath finish grout installed

Hall bath shower tile work complete

Metal stairs get a coat of paint

BSMT bedroom door installed

This week has seen nice progress on the second floor bathrooms, the flooring on the second floor, and the basement concrete floor. We also had our HVAC contractor deliver the 2nd floor furnace and water heater for full installation over the next week or two.

During this week, our tile contractor has completed laying tile in both the second floor master bathroom and hall bathroom. In the hall bath, you can see in the photo below that the shower lip has not been tiled. This is because of the weight of the glass panels, as well as occupants stepping on it, will eventually cause tile to crack in these locations. Instead, we will have our countertop contractor provide a thicker slab that will better support the weight placed on the shower lip.

Next, our hardwood flooring contractor had a busy week sanding, patching and staining the floor boards on the second floor. Sanding is done to smooth out any imperfections, but it also helps even out the new floor boards with the existing flooring. Next, our contractor applied a wood putty anywhere he felt there were wood imperfections, nail holes, nicks, etc. He then came through with the sander again to give the floor a smoother finish. Once this process was complete, he came through and applied a thick coat of stain. The floor takes several days to cure, after which we’ll continue with milwork, doors, and hopefully on to paint!

Finally, in the basement, over the course of the week, the concrete has been ground and polished to its final smoothness. After the final polish, the contractor applied a liquid densifier / hardener to the concrete. This product helps protect the concrete from stains, scratches and moisture and it gives the floor a nicer shine to it.