Tonight at midnight the ball will drop and the year 2019 will begin. That means from a historical preservation standpoint anything from 1969 or earlier is considered “historic”. Historic preservation has traditionally waited until at least 50 years has passed before allowing a structure to be recognized as historic. But, 1969 historic? That seems so close doesn’t it? Maybe it’s just my age and that now things considered historic are only one more year from the decade in which I was born. Don’t get me wrong, 1969 was definitely a year when a lot of history was made. July 20th saw the moon landing of Apollo 11, followed one week later by Ted Kennedy’s Chappaquiddick incident. Later that summer, the infamous Manson murders took place in California, the Miracle Mets finished an incredible comeback season, and Woodstock changed everything we thought we knew about music concerts. 1969 was certainly a year for the history books, but what about preserving the great architecture of that year? Gone were the Bungalows and Colonials in the late 1960s. Brutalist architecture was in its hay day, and modern architecture was waning and transitioning to the post modern style we are presently still entangled in. Vernacular styles like the Ranch Style were still popular, but other than a few notable standouts, most of the architecture of this period was departing from the quality materials and hand built techniques most of us preservationists have been so passionate about preserving. The question then becomes, “Is it good because it’s old, or does there need to be something more to it?” And to be honest with you, I don’t have an answer for you in this post. I’ve thought long and hard on this subject (I even wrote about it a few years back in The Historical Cusp), and as passionate as I am about preserving historic buildings, I don’t know that I would be as passionate about saving most of what was built in 1969. Certainly not nearly to the extent that I am concerned with saving things built in 1869. Maybe that’s alright, for now. Maybe we just need a little more time to consider some of these buildings that were born around the same time we were before we can be powerful advocates for their preservation. I think time will tell, but for now, when it comes to really old buildings, you can always count on me to be a “Building Hugger” as my friend Amy Swift’s company is so aptly named. You may just have to ask me twice about those built in 1969. The post Party Like It’s 1969? appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/party-like-its-1969/
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Here we are on Christmas Eve! Can you believe how fast this year has gone? I hope your shopping is all done and you’re ready to cuddle up beside the fireplace to stay warm tonight perhaps with some eggnog, or perhaps you need something a bit stronger. I wanted to leave you a little Christmas present of my own that you can share with all your friends and family who live in an old house. New house folks just won’t appreciate it, but for us brave old housers, it should ring true! Merry Christmas, thanks for all your support this year and I’ll see you in 2019! ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house, The children were nestled all snug in their cots. When down in the parlor there arose such a clatter, I grumbled and moaned ’bout the hole I should mend, The couch and the table were covered in lime. “You’re scraping, you’re sanding, you’re painting and mending! Like a man possessed I’d purchased this spot. And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof He was dressed all in denim, from his head to his foot, He pulled out a mixer and a bag of plaster. The stump of the hawk he held tight in his hand, He finished the ceiling, it was finished right quick, My wife in stunned silence as he said his goodbye, He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle, The post ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/twas-the-night-before-christmas/ Does aluminum rust? It’s a valid question and one that a lot of folks think they have the answer to, but you may be surprised by what I have to tell you about aluminum and its ability to stand up to corrosion. Aluminum is seen as a rockstar of corrosion resistance and is one of the few metals, along with stainless steel, that can hold up to exterior and coastal exposures over long periods of time. You already know that aluminum can last outside for decades, but what you want to know is does aluminum rust, right? The short answer is, yes, aluminum does rust. It just rusts in a different way than steel and iron rust. When exposed to oxygen, it forms aluminum oxide, just like steel forms iron oxide, but the difference lies in the chemical makeup of these two oxides. Iron oxide (rust) is a soft red colored metal that begins to expand and flake off as it is chemically transformed which exposes more of the underlying steel or iron to the air and the process continues until the metal is completely transformed to iron oxide. Aluminum oxide is different. It is actually quite hard and serves as a protective coating around the underlying aluminum. It doesn’t flake off like iron oxide and therefore, once the outer layer of aluminum “rusts” the process stops and the aluminum is protected. Couple that with the fact that it is a grayish color very similar to aluminum, and you may never even notice your aluminum’s rust. How to Treat Bare AluminumThat aluminum rust can protect bare aluminum indefinitely, but what if you want to paint the aluminum? In that case, you’ll need to sand off the aluminum oxide coating and get to clean aluminum, since most coatings don’t adhere well to aluminum oxide. Don’t plan for a paint job on any aluminum surface to last long if you haven’t sanded and cleaned it thoroughly prior to painting. Make sure to find a metal primer specifically designed for aluminum surfaces as well, since most basic primers and paints are not designed for this application. The post Does Aluminum Rust? appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/does-aluminum-rust/ What if you could jump in a time machine and see what historic preservation has accomplished over the last 10 years? Well, you can and I’ll show you how in this post! But, first we need to answer a couple of questions. Does preservation make a difference in our neighborhoods and towns? Is it worth the money? Is it worth the effort? Does it even matter? Sometimes it’s hard to see the difference historic preservation makes even when it’s right in front of you. Trying to see the improvements that preservation brings to a community is like trying to watch your kids grow. You might notice it over long periods of time, but on a day to day basis it seems like nothing is happening. I’ve been doing some research lately about how preservation affects our communities and I’ve started using a new tool that we all have access to, but you’d never really think of it as a preservation tool. I’ll explain how I use this tool as my preservation time machine, but first I wanted to talk about what the effects of historic preservation are on our communities. What Preservation DoesWhat is the point really? Why should we preserve rather than simply replace old, worn out buildings with new ones? It’s a valid question that every preservationist worth their salt should have an answer to. Why go through the trouble (and it is a lot of trouble)? Property ValuesThis is less focused on the work of actually restoring a building and more on the fact that areas designated as local historic districts consistently have property values that appreciate faster in good economies and hold their value better in bad economies. I’ve written about it extensively with various sources in this post if you want the details. Higher property values are good for homeowners who have more money and better for local communities who get higher property tax revenues. Win, win! Local EconomiesHistoric preservation and restoration is done locally. These old buildings aren’t picked up and moved somewhere else to be restored. They are fixed up by local contractors using local tradesmen who buy materials from local suppliers. The money spent on restoring these old buildings is funneled directly into the local economy helping way more people than just those who work on the job site. The rising tide of preservation truly lifts all boats. It’s More Than MoneyI told you we’d get the Google Maps part and here it is! If you live in a town that has old buildings then you can sometimes forget how things looked five, 10, or even 50 years ago. Times change and we very quickly forget what buildings and neighborhoods looked like back in the day. You can always take the time to dig through the archive at the local library or history center to find some really old pictures, but if you want to see how preservation progresses, try using Google Maps. Google has been great about driving down our busy streets and taking pictures of everything they see along the way to use as part of their “Street View” version of their maps program. Sometimes it’s a terrible hairdo or a dog pooping, but the focus is on getting pictures of addresses along the route. These pictures are often available to be scrolled over across multiple years, dating back to around 2007 in most cases when Google began posting these images. You can take these images and scroll back across the years to magically watch these neighborhoods transform. It’s a double edged sword because just as you can watch old buildings be brought back to life, you can see where some of preservation’s losses have happened and empty lots now stand in place of the historic building that once occupied the spot. How to Time Travel With GoogleGo to Google Maps and type in the address you’d like to see pictures of. You should see a street view of the address in the upper left hand corner of the screen. Click that image once and it will fill the screen. Now, in the top left corner of that full size image you should see a dialogue box that says “Street View” on the bottom like in the photo. Click the word “Street View” and if there are multiple image dates available for that address (some addresses have limited or no additional images) then you can drag the slider and click the image in the box to see how the building looked at that moment in time. Using this little time machine you can see how things looked and really get the feel for how neighborhoods and buildings have changed over the years. And it will only become more powerful as more images are added every year. You can literally watch preservation in progress year by year as we either restore or replace our old buildings. Use it to show your city or town how preservation has improved previously run down areas and revitalized the town. It’s a powerful tool since pictures speak so much louder than words. I’ve included a few pictures (credit to Google) of projects that my company has done or is in the process of completing below to give you a feel of what you can find. We all love a good before an after picture, but sometimes even a street cam from Google will suffice to show how truly vibrant historic preservation can make our towns. Click to view slideshow.The post Historic Preservation Time Machine appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/historic-preservation-time-machine/ This is the first time in four years that our house has felt finished enough to properly decorate for Christmas. Don't get me wrong, the house is FAR from finished and half of it is still very much in chaos, but we have more semi-finished rooms than we've ever had. And those rooms actually feel kinda homely - not something I've experienced for a very long time! Needless to say, decorating the house for Christmas this year felt quite different from the years before. Cue the Christmas tree of 2016: from http://www.kezzabeth.co.uk/2018/12/christmas-with-christmas-tree-world.html Asbestos siding was all the rage in the early part of the 20th-century. What Beanie Babies were to the 1990s, asbestos siding was to the the 1930s. Well maybe, it wasn’t quite the same, but you get the idea. It was immensely popular! If you are one of the folks whose house got dressed up with asbestos siding back in the day, all is not lost. There are ways that you can handle your siding safely to keep both you and your house safe. The presence of asbestos siding on your house is anything but a tragedy and hopefully through this post I can give you a little light at the end of the tunnel. Why Was Asbestos Siding Popular?There are a couple of very good reasons why asbestos siding became as popular as it did. When you put them all together, I’m surprised that more old houses are not covered in the stuff. Insurance CostsWith the exponential growth in American cities in the early 20th-century, there came an exponential growth of urban fires. Cramming more and more people into our cities in close proximity meant that the house fires common to that time quickly spread from building to building in these crowded cities. Whole cities were destroyed like in the Great Fire of Chicago in 1871 that destroyed 3.3 square miles. The pattern repeated itself in cities like Seattle in 1889, Jacksonville in 1901, Baltimore in 1904, and many others across the world. Insurance companies needed a solution and providing massive discounts to building owners who installed fireproof asbestos siding was the right fit for the time, since the health hazards of asbestos were not fully realized. Those discounts were like an adrenaline shot to the asbestos siding industry. Cheap & Available MaterialsAsbestos is a naturally occurring element and is very plentiful and relatively inexpensive. Saving money on both insurance and materials costs was a big win for any homeowner. Asbestos containing materials were easily manufactured and shipped across the world as the Industrial Revolution rolled full steam ahead. No MaintenanceOther than the fact that inhaling the fibers of asbestos can cause major health problems like asbestosis and mesothelioma, it truly is a miracle product. It is rot proof, insect proof, fire proof, requires no painting and no real maintenance at all, which was just as appealing to homeowners in the 1920s as it is today. How To Deal With Asbestos SidingHow do you know if it’s even asbestos siding? There are always the usual suspects, but the surest way to tell is to grab a small chunk and have it tested. I send 1″ pieces to Western Analytics and for only $30 they’ll send me a report detailing if there is asbestos and if so, what kind and how much. Such a deal! If you’ve got old asbestos siding and it’s in good shape, then there is really very little you need to do. It should last decades with minimal to no maintenance. Regular painting of the exterior of your house never hurts, though. If you hate the look and want it all removed so you can bring your house back the original wood appearance, that can be done, but the only safe way to do it is by hiring a certified asbestos abatement company to safely remove and dispose of the siding. Replacements For Asbestos SidingThe area that most people fall into is when you have broken pieces that need replacement and you can’t afford full removal. What can you do? Fortunately, there are companies that sell replacement fiber cement siding that looks almost exactly like the old stuff. The new stuff just doesn’t come with asbestos included. Take look at GAF Fiber Cement Siding to find the pattern that matches your house and order what you need. Removing old asbestos shingles is not technically difficult, but anytime you are working with asbestos, you need to take the proper safety precautions to make sure you are safe. Those precautions are very similar to working with lead paint, which you can read about here. The danger of asbestos is when it is friable and becomes airborne. Once airborne, the small fibers get stuck in your lungs and will not come loose eventually causing sickness. Containing those fibers and preventing them from becoming airborne is the key. I won’t go into the details of working safely with asbestos, because that is way beyond the scope of this post, but be sure you do your homework if you plan to tackle the work yourself. The moral of the story is don’t feel like a victim if you have asbestos siding. You have options. It can be left alone and perform admirably for years, it can be completely removed if budget allows and it can be patched and repaired for relatively little cost or danger. While I wouldn’t add it to my house today, I wouldn’t have a problem if it was already there. The post How To: Deal With Asbestos Siding appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/how-to-deal-with-asbestos-siding/ If you've followed me for a long time on Instagram, you'll remember I built a gate from pallet wood about two years ago for Grants mum's house, but I actually never got 'round to featuring on the blog. Luckily I'm making one again, bigger and better - and this time for our house and so, of course, I'm sharing it all! This whole project cost me under £10 to make, which is a serious bargain considering you can buy pre-made gates for over £50. It was also super easy to do, so if you want to save yourself some cash and give this DIY a go, then keep reading... Read more » from http://www.kezzabeth.co.uk/2018/11/diy-how-to-build-pallet-wood-gate.html It’s that time of year again! Time to buy gifts for the handyman or handywoman in your life who loves working with their hands. And I won’t judge you if you are buying for yourself this year (we all do that from time to time, right?) Like every year, I’ll give you some great gift ideas below for the DIYer in your life. Some ideas will get them excited to get back into the shop and some they can enjoy when they aren’t in the shop. Pull out your list and start marking people off knowing that the item below will bring lots of smiles not just at Christmas time, but year round! Vintage Wooden Christmas TreeLast year we made a bunch of these up and they sold like hotcakes, so this year, I’m made a few more in case you missed them. It’s a great piece of vintage decor that tell a story since it is made with reclaimed parting bead from historic windows. What could look better hanging on your plaster walls or sitting atop your mantle this Christmas? DIY Better T-shirtYour DIYer does it better than the rest of us, I know, so why not help them brag about it to their friends? These new shirts here at are super soft, athletic fitting and hold up to washing and shop abuse like pros. Plus, they come with free shipping! Old Windows In-DepthWhat’s the best new book on the market for an old house DIYer today? Old Windows In-Depth, of course! Okay, I may be a bit biased since I wrote it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t the best book to teach you step-by-step how to restore your old windows be they wood or steel. Get it in ebook or paperback! ProScraperWho likes lead paint? Not me! What if there was a super effective scraper that hooks up to most regular shop vacs and sucked up all the dust and paints chips before they had a chance to make a mess? Well, there is, and it’s called the ProScraper. Check it out and make 2019 a cleaner year than 2018 was at your house. Spring SetSetting nails in tight spaces can be difficult and even the pros will sometimes end up with bloody fingertips. The solution is something simple an old carpenter showed me years ago called a Spring Set tool. It’s a nail set that sets nails without a hammer! Just pull it back and the spring action sets them perfectly every time. You can also use it to punch out hinge pins on doors and casement windows. Speedheater CobraIt may be too cold to paint right now, but it’s never too cold to strip paint, especially with something that gets as hot as the Speedheater Cobra. If you’re looking for a fast and safe way to remove lots of layers of old paint from wood, then this is a serious tool used by restorers across the world. The best part is that its small size makes it very manageable to work with and convenient to store when not in use. BLENDEX Magnetic WristbandI mentioned this wristband as a gift idea for Father’s Day back in May and I’m mentioning it again because it’s just too cool! Getting a magnetic wristband will keep you from loosing bits or fasteners in your tool pouch or somewhere on the bench or worse the floor. It’s a huge time saver and very inexpensive!
The post 2018 Holiday Gift Guide appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/2018-holiday-gift-guide/ You may have heard the term Saltbox used when describing a house style and wondered, “what?” While the Saltbox house isn’t exactly an architectural style like the American Craftsman or Greek Revival, it is still a prominent architectural subtype of house that happens sometimes on purpose and sometimes as an afterthought. A Saltbox house is a traditional New England style wood frame house with a unique longe sloped roof on the back side. The main house is two-stories and the rear slopes down to one-story. It was named a Saltbox house because the shape is reminiscent of old colonial saltboxes in the kitchen. These wooded boxes kept the families supply of salt and had a distinct slope on one side to allow easier access to scoop salt out when needed. The Saltbox HouseThe Saltbox house became a popular style for both new homes and was the simplest way to put an addition onto the back of an existing I-frame house that was so common New England in colonial times. The simple rectangular design of these early American houses made the addition of a single story add-on to the rear very simple because the roof line could simply be extended to cover the new rooms unlike adding on to the side where there would have to be a new roof built and tied into the side of the house. The other big advantage to the Saltbox house was its ability to keep the house warmer in the cold New England winters. Having lived in Boston for a time, I know that winters in the northeast are no joke. The Saltbox house design shields the rear of the house from the brutal winds because it funnels the wind up and over the house rather than having it bast into the side walls. A lot of these Saltbox houses were built with prevailing wind patterns in mind and sited so that the rear of the house faced into the North, or whichever direction the strongest seasonal winds would blow in that particular region. It was smart planning for passive energy efficiency! The Saltbox house dates back to around 1650 and is one of the coolest designs since it is truly an example of form follows function. What was born out of necessity became a standard of regional design. And nothing says New England like a clapboard clad Saltbox house. The post What is a Saltbox House? appeared first on The Craftsman Blog. from https://thecraftsmanblog.com/what-is-a-saltbox-house/
Did someone just say it's FIVE weeks till Christmas?! I honestly don't know where this year has gone, and I can't believe in a couple of weeks our house will be fully decked up and ready for those repeating Christmas tunes!
With such little time left before Christmas, I've teamed up with Walton Flooring Centre to give one of you guys the chance to win a £40 gift card to spend in John Lewis. You could call it an early Christmas present perhaps ;) Read more »from http://www.kezzabeth.co.uk/2018/11/win-40-john-lewis-voucher-with-walton-flooring-centre.html |