WoodDance Studio » restoration http://wooddance.com Residential Home Improvement, New Canaan, CT Thu, 12 Jan 2012 05:20:23 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Removing old caulk and grout instead of rebuilding. http://wooddance.com/2011/03/24/removing-old-caulk-and-grout-instead-of-rebuilding/ http://wooddance.com/2011/03/24/removing-old-caulk-and-grout-instead-of-rebuilding/#comments Fri, 25 Mar 2011 02:57:42 +0000 admin http://wooddance.wp41.com/?p=334 Of all carpentry tasks, one that suits my perfectionist nature is tile work. I especially enjoy working with materials that stand a chance of lasting 100 years. Some of my tile installations have the potential to outlast their dwellings.

“We need new tiles in our bathroom. When we shower, water leaks through the floor.”

grout_removal - wooddance studio

This past winter I arrived at two separate homes to find very similar situations. Both are old homes with very nice original tiles installed on thick mortar backing. Though anything is possible, the repair budget for these middle class homes likely wouldn’t afford same-quality replacement work.

Since my forté is restoration, and in both situations there was no structural damage to the wood behind, I opted to restore the original work instead of replace it. In both bathrooms, layer upon layer of caulking, upon layer of disgusting old caulk combined with crumbling grout made these showers look gross but seeing beyond the layers of silicon and stained grout lines to tiles that were still in great condition I chose restoration of the original. I love the old basket-weave tile floor and appreciate the style of the old work. (Sometimes not so much a fan of the colors…)

It’s fairly labor intensive to remove all the grout and decades of caulk but in the end the bathrooms do look freshly restored and the homeowners are shocked at the transformation.

]]> http://wooddance.com/2011/03/24/removing-old-caulk-and-grout-instead-of-rebuilding/feed/ 2 My return to the deck at Springbough http://wooddance.com/2005/04/08/my-return-to-the-deck-at-springbough/ http://wooddance.com/2005/04/08/my-return-to-the-deck-at-springbough/#comments Fri, 08 Apr 2005 14:37:16 +0000 admin http://wooddance.com/2005/04/08/my-return-to-the-deck-at-springbough/ Well, my first repair and alteration to the deck on this Frank Lloyd Wright home lasted a few years and then…
A new owner and a new way of thinking, or is it an old way of thinking? Either way I was hired to demolish my work and restore the original design. Thank Goodness!
This renovation was straight-forward: Have new Mahogany lumber milled for siding and hand-rails, strip my previous work off the cantilever and rebuild it as intended. Since the fiberglass deck surface was in good shape and the framing had been addressed years earlier this time Mahogany was the only material that needed replacement.
The second photo shows me kicking the railings apart. Demolishing work that I have previously spent time and care to construct is nothing new to me. This renovation was just and the result was satisfying.
Now the deck on Frank Lloyd Wright’s Springbough has been restored to the original design and hopefully will last for many many years to come.

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