718 I St- Before Pics

About three weeks ago we started a new project at 718 I St. NE, in DC. It's a few blocks north of Capital Hill and only one block north of H St, which is being totally revamped. H St is being billed as the next hot spot in DC, with tons of bars, restaurants, condos and shopping.


The house is a really exciting opportunity to rehab a classic DC victorian rowhouse. It's still got nearly all of it's original features. Although the house had been gutted by a previous owner, it still has all the original hardwood floors, trim, pocket doors and radiators. The house wasn't really in terrible shape, but it needed pretty much everything. The basement had been dug up to replace the sewer main, and then never repoured. The house had no plumbing, electric, or functioning heating system. There was also a massive hole on the first floor where an old bathroom had rotted through the floor. Here's the way the house looked on day one:

Here's the beast. This will look great with a little TLC.

This picture didn't come out that well, but it will still give you a decent idea of the condition. The previous demo crew did a good job of tearing out the junk but keeping what was important.

This is the old kitchen, or what was left of it. Hard to imagine anyone enjoying that ugly yellow paint.

This is how the basement looked when we bought the house. There was literally a ditch through the center of the house. In this picture, one of the plumbers' guys is leveling out the trench so the new pipes will lay flat.

This is the upstairs closet that will be the master bath, complete with a custom shower. We're going to take out the divider and just put the two closets together to make one bathroom.

This is a shot from the middle bedroom (there are three). You can see where the second bathroom will be (behind the radiator) and into the back bedroom. Behind that board is a door, which will be a small balcony.

The best part of this house is the grand spiral stairway, which I'm realizing now that I don't have any pictures of on my camera. I'll make sure to take some tomorrow.