Chronicling my adventures restoring and updating a quirky old Philadelphia rowhouse
First of, how was Puerto Rico? It was really great. I don’t know what to say about it so I’ll leave you with some pictures. Back to cold Pennsylvania and the shutters. We’ve been leaning the lower tiers against the windows for privacy while I procrastinated on the uppers. So I laid them out in…
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So far, I haven’t done much. In the 1920’s or 30’s someone redid all the woodwork downstairs and put deep sills right over the original 19th Century sills. I stripped these, trimmed them to fit in the slightly modified openings, and added little blocks of wood to get them level. Look how crooked the original…
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The first time I drooled over pocket shutters was, I think, at the Winterthur Museum when I was about 5. So naturally, when I found evidence suggesting the Crooked House originally had them, I was hoping for a way to recreate them. But I figured I could never justify the price of having them made…
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I want to take a look at the front wall before I bought the house. But first, here’s what it looks like now. And here’s one of those few I remaining spots where the before was nicer, at least in some ways. The casing on the left window was super super crooked even though the…
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I’m hoping to start facade restoration next year as soon as there’s no risk of frost. In the meantime, I need to take my front door off and refinish it while the awnings are still up. I will be locking the house with an old fashioned skeleton key in the vestibule door in the meantime.…
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