"B4" and "In-progess" House Renovations

In this post I wanted to show a couple more major renovation projects going on in my neighbourhood. I've been following their progress for awhile now, and I again had to access Google Maps Street View to get my "before" images.

The first photo shows how the house appeared in early Spring of 2010. The owners really worked hard to transform it into the character home shown in the second shot. My wife and I toured it during an Open House just for fun. We were quite impressed.


This second property had me worried at the start because I wasn't sure if the orange mesh surrounding the boulevard trees was erected before imminent demolition of the house, or simply for a major renovation. Typically in Vancouver, protection barriers are erected around trees that are intended to remain on sites on which selected or whole demolition will take place.

I am happy to report that in this case it is a major renovation that is being performed. The second photo of this house shows it after the original roof was removed and a full 2nd storey added (or 3rd if you count the basement). It's not easy to tell this is the same house from the 2 photos, but the green stucco ties them together.

The last reno I want to show you today is a house that was brought to my attention 4 or 5 years ago just before friends of ours moved to Toronto.

They lived close to Sophia Street and E. 20th, and in strolling along nearby streets with their one year old son they happened upon a really cool, totally original old house just off Main Street.

I was sure I photographed it at that time, but I can't find the photos in my database. I really seem to be plugging Street View in this segment, but it really has come in handy for this "before and after" blog.

The house was kind of a time capsule, complete with faded paint on the old cladding shingles. It was a big house, and Nick said if they hadn't been planning to move to Toronto he would have really wanted to buy the place and renovate it (although it wasn't even for sale at that point). The property included a large 2 car garage at the lane's edge. Nick's grand plan would have been to turn that into a rentable studio.

At this stage of construction it's a bit challenging to relate the "before" condition to the "now" shot, but you can still see the same faded pink shingles on the exterior walls of the upper floor dormers. That's the common bond between all 3 photos.

It appears that the building footprint is now substantially larger, but I can't verify that quantitatively because I can't find my "b4" picture of the back yard.

Also, work is being done to the garage. Currently there is a program in Vancouver to encourage laneway housing. I wonder if the plan for this garage will be to transform it into a separate residence.

CCM Project Progress

I finally got going on my 1948 CCM bicycle project. After a search through my photo database revealed I had had the bike for 5 years now, I made some inquiries into reputable painters. After I chose one, I disassembled the bike and sent it off for a re-spray.


I’m pretty happy with the results, I have to say. The “wheat” rims really offset the black frame.


The next step will be to get a multi-speed rear hub, and get both rims re-spoked. Then I wouldn’t mind finding a pin-striper that can apply 2 thin lines to the rims on either side of the spokes, just as was done originally.

There’s still a long way to go, but new paint is definitely a great start.

Heritage House

Wow.

Summer’s over and I didn’t blog once.

Not even a single time.

It’s certainly not that it was a boring summer by any means; the highlight was our week-long trip to Portland. I’ll blog about it soon.

Right now, however, I want to show you something very interesting going on in my neighbourhood.

“There is

a house

on Prince Albert Street…

they call

the Rising Sun…”

(sung to the tune of “House of the Rising Sun” by The Animals)

To be honest, I didn’t think there were many Rising Suns left in this particular old house. It’s been an eyesore for the 8 years we’ve lived here. So much so in fact that a neighbour of ours wrote a complaint letter a year or so ago to the Editor of our local Vancouver Courier newspaper. In it, she asked the owner of the house to either fix it up, or do the neighbourhood a favour, and sell it.

It was to the point that large built-up beams had been installed on a steep angle, affixed to stakes pounded into the front lawn, to support the second storey that overhung the front porch. At some point in the relatively recent past the original vertical supports had been removed from the porch rendering the 2nd floor a cantilevered structure, a task it had never been intended to perform.

Upon review of my digital photo archive stored on CDs and DVDs, I discovered that I did not have a “before” photo of that house. A quick Google query directed me to a site that taught me how to save an image from Google Maps Street View.


Voila; now I have a photo from early Spring 2010 showing the angled beams supporting the 2nd floor. Compare this to the shot I took this morning which shows a mini excavator sitting in the now scooped-out basement. I was thinking the other night it must be a bit of an eerie feeling to be operating machinery underneath a several-ton structure perched upon 4 stacks of wood.
It’s certainly an interesting project. Recently an article appeared in the local paper informing us that this 110 year old house has new owners, an engineer/ design graduate married couple, and their plans are to completely restore the house, with modern amenities of course. It looks like Stage One is to raise it to install a functional full-height basement.

I’m pretty excited about this one. I’ll keep you posted.

Actually there are several more extensive renovations afoot in my ‘hood. I’ll post “before” and “current” restoration shots soon.