crotchety
The beds at the motel that we stay at in Detroit are very old and become instantly U-shaped when you lie down on them. My back and legs have been stiff ever since we came back and it’s making me feel really old.
Also, I’m watching this home improvement show, Moving Up, and losing my shit at this one couple who bought this GORGEOUS old Craftsman house with all of these pristine original fixtures and are like, “This wood is too dark. We’re going to paint it white like a bunch of wack ass landlords so that it can look like we’re renting.”
It’s hitting a sensitive spot because we have a big old Victorian Pittsburgh house with a lot of original wood and while the previous owners were good about keeping the first floor wood fixtures, they painted the second and third floor fixtures when they turned it into an apartment. When we bought the house, we ran out of money for home improvements pretty quickly and have just been making do for the past few years, biding our time until the husband was done with school and able to get a decent job. We’re finally able to do a little bit of finishing work to the third bedroom and in the course of discussing that we were thinking about what we would need to do to get the hideous matte paint off of the trim. Seriously, if you own an old house and the wood is in good condition, LEAVE IT ALONE.
May 31st, 2009 at 1:40 pm
Aaaaaaahhhhhh. Noooooooooooooooo.
Oh my God that is disturbing.
Oh God watching someone paint original wood in a Craftsman house would be like watching someone squash baby ducks.
June 1st, 2009 at 9:06 am
Our first house was a 30’s vintage stucco joint with plaster lathe walls & oak floors. We went to considerable effort stripping the upstairs woodwork only to discover after talking to people that the woodwork had always been painted. Similarly I spent days taking plaster off the chimney in the kitchen, but again, it had been plastered since the house was built.
No idea about your house, but I do have some advice about stripping: Don’t mess around trying to strip it in place. Pry it off, and strip it outside. Also, test it for lead if you haven’t already. If it’s got lead paint on it, either paint over it with a heavy duty enamel, or get it removed altogether and replace it with new wood. Lead paint is nasty and it takes a professional to get rid of without permanently contaminating your entire house with the stuff.
June 1st, 2009 at 11:02 am
The lady we bought our house from was SO PROUD of all the work she put into “modernizing” the place. She took out all the original 1870s woodwork because she “hates dusting.” she put in drop ceilings because the original high ceilings were’nt “cozy.” She also hates painting so she did all the walls she could in textured plaster.
Bless her heart, I curse her every day.
THe only good thing is, without the original fixtures to respect, we can do whatever the hell we want. Pink walls and snowleopard print living room, anyone?…
BTW: I covet your stained glass.