After!!

I really, really like a good "before and after". Mostly what motivates me with any type of home renovation is the  idea that I am creating some sort of spectacular transformation. I love the contrast of a new space or object with what it was. Our house on Brunswick Street was the most significant renovation we have ever, or will ever, take on and the before and after photos are astounding to me every time I look back at them.

We started on Thanksgiving weekend with help from many supportive family members and friends. The plaster walls were unsalvageable so they came out. We removed almost 10 tonnes of plaster and other construction and demolition debris by the end of the project. The house was semi-detatched so it only had three outside walls, two of which were rotten and so they were re-built. The wiring and plumbing were completely replaced. The wood floors on the main floor were rotted through in spots so we replaced them with a polished concrete slab with in-floor heating. I think this is the thing I miss the most about that house. Concrete floors are virtually indestructible, especially if you have an over-exuberant chocolate lab that likes to scrabble around. 

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In the end, we were able to save the floors upstairs, the beautiful hand carved banister,  the plaster crown molding in the hallway downstairs, and the door trim. My father and I spent countless hours burning and scraping the decades of paint off them to reveal the original details of the trim. When we were done I actually had my lead levels tested just in case (I may have a wee bit of hypochondria). We fought to keep the decorative molding in the living room but the carpenters damaged it in a desire to work from a clean slate. I am sure this is a battle many other people trying to restore heritage homes also face. We put in an IKEA kitchen, built a deck, and replaced the debris pile out back with a garden.

Although we moved in less than three months into the project, we did not finish all the little details for another year. In the end the house was a perfect mix of old and new. And then we sold it.

When you are living in a renovation all you see are the little details that still need to be taken care of, or aren't quite perfect. Everything you do that makes one thing or space look better seems to just make the undone projects around it look extra crappy in comparison. We only stayed on Brunswick Street for 18 months and I think part of the reason was because everywhere we looked we saw the little things we hadn't quite done perfectly, and the memory of the stress of doing such a huge renovation in a short period of time. We learned so, so much from working on that house and there are still things about it that we really miss but we had to move on. Looking at the photos I still see those little imperfections and mistakes we made and so it makes me glad that we sold it when we did.