Pouring Walls

Ramp on the West Side


Bilco door basement entry walls

Here comes the Drywall...

Upstairs front room facing west.


Downstairs back room facing north.

The Big Dig

Without parked cars lining the street, it really is a
Grand Avenue! We are making a mess with the
backhoe to lay down footings for the ramp, bilco door
and front porch.


Forms to pour footings for ADA Ramp.




Forms to pour footings for Bilco Door Steps

Some Neighborhood Buildings

Here's a photo from our West Side Festival which takes place every September. The red building is 70 Beekman St which was completely renovated early this decade and houses an Art Gallery and a very special shop called Mimosa owned by Michelle and Michael LaLonde. One part of the shop specializes in fine craft accessories for home and wear, the other is a painting and art furniture gallery. It is a must-stop on Beekman Street. www.mimosagallery.com




Our next door neighbor on Grand Ave. Needs some TLC, nice Victorian details...




Beekman Artists Co-op at 79 Beekman St.
This building houses clay artists on the first floor and painters on the second floor.
Beautiful outdoor sculpture garden, perfect for pleine air events in the spring and summer. http://www.beekmanartists.com

As requested from one of our followers, here are some other buildings in the neighborhood.

You can see they range from mid 1800's federal style to Victorian to 21st century! It is an eclectic mix which is what we love about the West Side...

Here is the home of Phinney Architects www.phinneydesign.com (built in 2004), Feast Gallery, and on the bottom floor, The Local Pub and Teahouse. http://www.feastgallery.com/thelocal2 142 Grand Ave across the street from us.

Nick works the backhoe to prepare for ramp footings. It's frozen about 2 feet down but he digs a hole about 6' deep along the west side of the building for the ramp footings.

2,4,6,8 Now it's time to Insulate!

Next big step; Drywall.




It has been an entire month since my last post (busy with design work for our trade show in Baltimore.) The wintery month of February has come and gone but the intrepid crew at 143 Grand springs forward...Rough electrics, plumbing, and heating were completed, inspected, and approved. Framing to accomodate the insulation and drywall was finished up.

My Mom and Dad visit from Skaneateles. Having been through old house reconstruction themselves they are very encouraging and supportive of our project... They have already volunteered to help paint trim and plant gardens this spring!

Windows Are In!

Starting to come together, almost all the windows are installed. The crew took advantage of some 30 degree days to finish up this stage. We'll wait for the 70 degree days to test out the screens!

More Windows Installed....

Let the Sun Shine In!

What a difference light and a view make! One down, 42 to go!!

The first windows are installed. Classic doublehung, 2 over 2, beige clad, 43 windows in all.

Schuyler helps with the shoveling before taking off for a Nordic ski race in the afternoon. Good warmup for strong pole planting! Go Blue Streaks!

The windows are here!

Out with the Old, In with the New....

We load up the old doublehungs in the van and take them down to the

Architectural Warehouse in Albany, a treasure trove of salvaged materials. Check it out at

http://www.historic-albany.org/warehous.html Mark the manager there was happy to accept our donation and thought he would be able to find a good home for them. We plan to return later on to find some exterior doors, and maybe a big old kitchen utility sink I had my eye on.....

Meanwhile, back on Grand Ave, installation of the new doublehungs should begin this week; the snow has subsided enough for the time being to work on the exterior.

This is the little back porch also getting a major makeover. We'll have lots of stoops to watch the scene on Beekman Street this summer!

Gas line, hot and cold water lines, and waste water drain pipe installed upstairs and downstairs, nearly complete.

Porch floor is down! I'm trying to imagine spending time out here on a lunch break this summer.

We've had a couple feet of new snow. We try to keep a path clear for all our neighborhood dogwalkers...

Side Porch facing Beekman. Cement piers support framework for new porch floor.

We like this soft greenish teal for the clapboard. The metal roof is the olive brown shade on the right. We're thinking trim colors will be beige and terracotta tones. the terracotta for a little punch.

Time to choose color of the siding. We are going with cement board siding which is low maintenance but has the appearance of old-fashioned clapboard. It will blend in with the original clapboard areas that we can salvage from the back part of the house.