Yeah, we do windows..

[Sherita]

No, not like that. Like this:


These wooden sash windows are pretty close to their century mark, and the years are showing. Our job is to remove them, rebuild them, and reinstall. The trick is, this is a historical restoration, so any repair work must match the original as closely as possible. Several of the sashes are too far gone to save, which means building new ones, by hand, to the original specs. Keep in mind, the tooling to build these windows hasn't been seen in 50 years or more. What you see above is pretty typical of all four sets windows (5 in each set). Every single piece of glass was removed (all 90 panes) and then re-installed in the newly rebuilt sashes, then glazed by hand (360 runs of glazing), but only after 75+ years of paint and grime were removed. The first set is completed, and we are going back in with them.


The first two are in and trimmed back out, three more to go. I forgot to mention that we are also building/rebuilding the frames and sills as we reinstall. Nitpicky, slow, and aggravating. But it will look soo good with all new windows. It's backbreaking work, but something a person can really take pride in. Something that can truly be called "hand crafted".

Don't try this with a local contractor from the orange box store

[Scutterborn]

That's amazing!


-Ben-

[SABOB]

Impressive, there's something about doing things "old school" that I like


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[lildingy]

Not like this?

MenInKilts_Kilt_Crew_On_Truck.PWC.jpg

[Sherita]

"Old school" is the only way to do these. They were handcrafted the first time, and are again this time.

I specialize in houses built before 1950, particularly single wall and hybrid construction. But this is a stretch for even me. I would lay odds that there are only a handful of people left in the U.S. who know how to build historical wooden sash windows by hand (and by hand I mean BY HAND, you can't buy the correct size lumber, the right ogee router bit, the right dovetail blades......they do not exist anymore. Every last piece is fit, shaped and trimmed individually).

This kind of stuff is true craftsmanship, at its' very finest.

[Europhyllia]

This is turning out lovely! I'd love to see the whole house.

[Sherita]

Karin, I will have some photos up when we are done. But, it's not a house. It's the community center, which was, in the past, the two room school house for a very small community just south of me. The building is right at 100 years old. Original hardwood floors are still present. The building partially burned in the 30's and was rebuilt. We are actually uncovering some of the charred wood and damage during this rebuild. It's pretty fascinating.

[Fenker]

Looks awesome! Where I am from the old really is back in. My home town was built in the 1800's. A true old west town. During the "redwood rush" the town was built, everything made of redwood hand crafted, even the septic tanks were made of redwood and still in use today. But with people building new homes they want to keep that old school style with a 21st century design. I am a young cabinet maker by trade and love the craftsmanship that was put into the old stuff. Looking at a piece of furniture from over 100 years ago, it is extremely difficult to figure out how they actually built it. And even if u knew how to build it, its nearly impossible to make it as perfect as they did back then
truly is an art. I plan on starting my own cabinet business within a year and really hone my skulls of old woodworking.

[Sherita]

Done with that set

Here they are before


And after


Property owners are thrilled, which makes me pretty darn happy too.

We start on the next set this weekend. That means 90 more panes of glass to deal with

[Europhyllia]

wow that was a lot of work. Looks great.