Check out the progress at the Curbly House! Demolition is done, and framing is mostly complete. I’ve been working on a project in the basement, and painting is well under way in the rooms that aren’t in need of any structural work. Here’s a quick visual progress tour:
First up: kitchen demolition and framing
As a reminder: this is a before shot. The ‘kitchen’ was through the opening on the right, and this area was sort of wasted space in between the dining room (behind us) and the living room (front left).
After taking out the old cabinets and appliances, Jon and I started pulling down two walls (the one in front of you, and the one perpendicular to it, on the right). Here’s how to properly remove an interior wall.
Then our framing contractor came over and installed a structural beam between the kitchen and the dining room. That’s the big green thing you see here. As you can see, we still have some electrical to move, and we discovered a ventilation duct that we weren’t expected in one of the walls. We’ll have to talk to our HVAC contractor to get that moved somewhere else ($$$), because that’s exactly where the kitchen peninsula is going!
Here’s a cleaned up shot:
A new entryway and foyer
Note the big plywood panel covering a hole in the back of the house! This is on purpose! We’re turning what used to be a mostly pointless dining room closet (what?) into a new entryway and ‘foyer’.
Why would you need a big closet right off the dining room, anyway? Instead, that space will become (we think) the primary entry into the home; with a bench, some storage, and coat hooks. It’s not much to look at yet from outside, but at least you can picture it (right?):
This space will get a new door with built-in blinds and a retractable screen (plenty of access to light and outside air).
We’ll be sprucing up the front entryway as well, with a gorgeous full glass insert from Zabitat. The cool thing is, we can keep the original door (it’s solid), but update it to allow more light into the house. Here’s the style we’re going with:
Basement progress
Meanwhile, I spent a few days this week working on a project I’m really excited about (and will be blogging more about later): the basement!
We teamed up with The Home Depot for this room, and I had some fun installing shiplap paneling on the featured wall (this is going to be a ‘family/rec room’).
Here’s what it looked like before:
And, after nailing up several dozen of these guys (MDF Shiplap interior siding), and hanging a new door:
Painting, painting, painting
We also made lots of painting progress this week. Most of the trim is done, and ceilings are under way. I made several trips to my local Sherwin-Williams store to pick up gallons and gallons of the good stuff (and it doesn’t hurt that there’s a coffee shop right next door).
We’ve also gotten really friendly with our FedEx delivery guy over the last few weeks, since he’s been dropping off furniture packages like they’re on fire:
That’s most of the furnishings – all from our our partner, Hayneedle – for the living room, dining room, and master bedroom. If you missed it, here’s Alicia’s post on her design ideas for those rooms.
Bye, bathroom
Ok, that heading’s a little exaggerated: we’re not actually demoing the whole upstairs bathroom, mostly just replacing some tile and fixtures. But I couldn’t help the alliteration. Anyway: fortunately this floor tiling proved really easy to pull up, so we’re going to be ready to put down new tile very soon.
Next up: our electrician will be running all new circuits for the kitchen, and next week the HVAC guys will be putting in a new furnace and air conditioning.
