718 I St- New Color and Trim

This week we began installing all of the new trimwork. We went with a really thick (10 in tall) baseboard in order to match the original baseboards. We also put in crown moulding throughout the entire house, including the bathrooms. In addition, we repainted the front of the building with a more sensible color, and we also started tiling in the basement and in the bathroom. Tomorrow, a crew is coming in to begin painting the interior, and the welder is coming back to install the balcony and the front gate. Later this week we'll put in the basement kitchen, toilets, vanities, etc...

Here's the new green color:

A closeup. We are going to paint the concrete step and black handrail last.



Here's how the new baseboard looks as it goes in:



We're using all of the original doors. A few are missing, which we'll replace with from an architectural salvage store called Second Chance in Baltimore.



Here is the 18 X 18 tile we used throughout the entire basement. It will "pop" a little more once the grout is finished.




In the next day or so, I'll upload pictures of all of the new window trim and crown molding.

412 Mellon- Drywall at Last

Our condo conversion project at 412 Mellon St SE is coming along really well, and we're thrilled with the progress. After a few days as a bland grey color, we decided to liven up the block a little by painting our building a cream yellow color. It came out really nicely. After the black shutters are installed, the white window trim will mesh really nicely with the yellow.

The drywall is all hung and is in the process of being taped, mudded and sanded. The drywall crew came in on Saturday with twenty (yes, 20) workers and taped and mudded the entire building in one day. That's over 550 sheets of drywall in about 12 hours. A job like that typically would take almost two weeks! I was definitely impressed.

Here's the crew installing the aluminum flashing around the new vinyl windows:



The plans originally called for a straight run of steps, but when we actually got to building them, they were way too steep. We came up with the design below, which looks even better. We made a large landing at the top to allow for appliances to come through these rear doors. Later, I envision someone using it for a barbecue area. You can see they had to remove some of the new siding in order to install trim around the windows. That should be fixed today or tomorrow.



This picture shows how the new paint matches up with the siding on the rear of the building.



Here is the top upper left unit. You can see the light coming through the shaft where the huge new skylight will be installed.



This is one of the four bathrooms. We built a nice step into the jacuzzi to allow for easier access. We decided to make it extra wide so it isn't dangerous when the tile gets wet.



This is the status of the lower units. We plan on putting some sort of shelving or wine rack on the return in the middle of the unit in order to maximize the space.