Where it all began

The reality is I can’t even remember deciding to buy a house. One minute we were living in separate apartments, having just started dating a year earlier, and the next we were proud owners of a derelict (this is an understatement) townhouse in an up and coming area of downtown Halifax on Brunswick Street.

From what I know, in its glory days, Brunswick Street was amazing - or at least part of it was. It used to be two different streets: Barrack Street was the southern end that bordered Citadel Hill and Brunswick Street was the northern section where the more affluent set lived. One of my Halifax history books says that Barrack Street, mostly populated by sailors (go figure), was also known as “Knock ‘em down Street” due to its rough and tumble reputation.

In the early 19th century the north end of Brunswick was the suburbs of Halifax. Here you will still find traces of some of the beautiful historic architecture that Halifax is known for. There are landmarks such as the Little Dutch Church and St. George’s round church.

Parts of Brunswick Street were damaged during the Halifax Explosion, although many homes still remain. Unfortunately with the construction of the Cogswell Street interchange at the corner of Brunswick and Cogswell Street, the northern half of Brunswick Street was effectively cut off from the rest of the downtown. Some houses in the neighbourhood fell into disrepair and the area became known more for violence and other criminal activity. Even when we lived there we still heard of crime happening a few blocks north of us, but it wasn’t anything we ever experienced first hand or even worried about. With new townhome developments the area continues to be gentrified. Gentrification is controversial for sure, but it is still nice to see many of the big old houses being returned to their former beauty.

Enough of the history lesson. In October 2006, Kerry and I found ourselves to be the proud owners of this little gem:

The living room - our carpenter speculated the chimney may have been holding up the entire house.

The grand staircase

The kitchen and lovely bath. The caution tape was to warn about the part of the floor that was collapsing.

The tree growing out of the back wall. Our carpenter took it and planted it in his yard.

Every time I look back at these photos I am really not sure what we were thinking. We closed the sale of the house October 6, 2006 and we were living there by Christmas. The pace of work was insane and with Kerry and I managing the project and doing a large chunk of the work ourselves we nearly lost our minds and almost killed each other. Luckily we were able to hold onto our sanity and the results of our hard work and the hard work of our families and friends were beyond our expectations. Tomorrow I will post the after photos - right now I hear a baby calling my name…