The 'landing' - Before
At the center of the house is this odd little space I've chosen to call 'the landing': it's a 7'x7' room with 6 doors and a built-in cabinet. The north wall has doorways to the kitchen and living room, the east wall has doors to the stairs leading to the second floor and the back bedroom, the south wall has the bathroom door, and the west wall has the front bedroom and the cabinet. All the doors and the cabinet were trimmed with the same 1920s vintage door trim (moderately good quality pine) jammed together on the north and east walls, and the only real wall space was 4' on the south wall, where the previous owners had stuck up a full-length mirror with little plastic clips. Oh yeah, it has a 9' ceiling, too. Everything was painted cream except the doors, which were cheap veneer.
Unfortunately I did not get a 'before' picture of this space, but it was dark and claustrophobic. The light fixture in the space was (I think) a refugee from the 1950s or 1960s - it looked like someone had taken a big skinny metal can (like a foot long section of 6' pipe) and punctured it with a nail for a kind of 'starlight' effect. Put a 40w bulb in it, suspend it 2' from the ceiling, and all you get for light is a little spot dead-center on the floor.
The floor itself was a horror. The blue-green shag carpet used in the living room was there as well, but with an added element of surprise. When we pulled out the living room carpet, we tried to keep going into the landing and discovered linoleum - that funny embossed linoleum that looks like irregular little white/tan pavers with grey grouting. The carpet was returned until it was finally time to get the house in shape.
First thing to do - pull down all the door frames! Why? Well, the original house had doors in all the openings - the frame for the doorway to the kitchen obviously had spots for hinges and the strike plate, but they were long gone. We removed the door from the living room and the stairway to just make life easier (the doors weren't needed, and were in the way when they were open). I removed the doors to the built-in, and did a little exploratory paint removal with 3-M's Safest Stripper (no fumes, not awful to the skin, but slow..) and discovered 7 layers of paint: a couple of creams/whites, aqua, yellow, a funny green, weird dark brown, and a base layer of pale yellow that is impervious to the stripper and is kind of brittle (may be shellac instead of paint).
Since we were in the demolition mood, we pulled up the carpet and the disintegrating carpet pad, and got to work on the linoleum with a floor scraper. The linoleum was old and brittle enough that it just snapped off in plates, leaving the paper backing stuck to the floor. Thankfully, a bucket of hot soapy water, a scrub brush, and the scraper got the stinking mess away. Good news: there was hardwood underneath. Bad news part 1: the kitchen floor has 5 layers of floor built up (including a layer of lauan plywood). Bad news part 2: when they put the linoleum in, they used a floor sander to scuff the surface of the hardwood and put big circular gouges in the floor.
It's not too clear on the picture, but they were easy to see in person. This was taken at the center of the east wall. The stairs are in the opening to the left.
Take a deep breath, and sigh...
Unfortunately I did not get a 'before' picture of this space, but it was dark and claustrophobic. The light fixture in the space was (I think) a refugee from the 1950s or 1960s - it looked like someone had taken a big skinny metal can (like a foot long section of 6' pipe) and punctured it with a nail for a kind of 'starlight' effect. Put a 40w bulb in it, suspend it 2' from the ceiling, and all you get for light is a little spot dead-center on the floor.
The floor itself was a horror. The blue-green shag carpet used in the living room was there as well, but with an added element of surprise. When we pulled out the living room carpet, we tried to keep going into the landing and discovered linoleum - that funny embossed linoleum that looks like irregular little white/tan pavers with grey grouting. The carpet was returned until it was finally time to get the house in shape.
First thing to do - pull down all the door frames! Why? Well, the original house had doors in all the openings - the frame for the doorway to the kitchen obviously had spots for hinges and the strike plate, but they were long gone. We removed the door from the living room and the stairway to just make life easier (the doors weren't needed, and were in the way when they were open). I removed the doors to the built-in, and did a little exploratory paint removal with 3-M's Safest Stripper (no fumes, not awful to the skin, but slow..) and discovered 7 layers of paint: a couple of creams/whites, aqua, yellow, a funny green, weird dark brown, and a base layer of pale yellow that is impervious to the stripper and is kind of brittle (may be shellac instead of paint).
Since we were in the demolition mood, we pulled up the carpet and the disintegrating carpet pad, and got to work on the linoleum with a floor scraper. The linoleum was old and brittle enough that it just snapped off in plates, leaving the paper backing stuck to the floor. Thankfully, a bucket of hot soapy water, a scrub brush, and the scraper got the stinking mess away. Good news: there was hardwood underneath. Bad news part 1: the kitchen floor has 5 layers of floor built up (including a layer of lauan plywood). Bad news part 2: when they put the linoleum in, they used a floor sander to scuff the surface of the hardwood and put big circular gouges in the floor.
It's not too clear on the picture, but they were easy to see in person. This was taken at the center of the east wall. The stairs are in the opening to the left.
Take a deep breath, and sigh...