Exterior Candaulism

The extensive exterior restoration is complete…finally! This project was a very painful one, watching many parts of the brick and stone exterior be dismantled so she could be repaired. When it comes to structural things on the house, I become extremely nervous and paranoid that something will go wrong and will cause her to never look the same again…. or just give up and collapse (I am aware that is overdramatic!).

With that being said, we only had a few minor hiccups, one MAJOR hiccup and she looks the way she is supposed to. When we purchased the home, there was a lot of missing mortar for them top to bottom but the largest exterior issues we had were structural issues with the front porch and the stone feet of the columns on the portico.

We lucked out and found an awesome stone restoration company ready and able to do the work. The work began with the limestone feet of the front porch being dug out and reset on a new base keeping them from falling out again. The loose base had caused most of the brick walls and porch to sink and fall away from the house over the years.

The company also knew where to source our pink limestone that was used for the wall caps, skirting, ledges, and the feet of the portico columns. They took measurements created drawings and in 1 month, we had replicated and hand-carved feet to go back into place allowing the structure to continue to stand for another 100 years.

our major hiccup was when they brought the lift in so they could do the upper portions of the house. The operator was on the phone while using the lift and when he came down from the East side of the house, he swung the lift outward and took off the front porch that was wrapped around the side of the house. This led to a few meltdowns, neighbors calling and texting with condolences and a lot of profanity… A LOT!

It was all repaired BUT, the positive to the accident is we found inside of the stone walls of the porch, decorative brick that was needed to make repairs to the face of the porch that was not findable and would have costed WAY too much money to recreate. There is always a silver lining!

This project took a total of 7 months due to weather and crew but it is completed and shouldn’t need to be touched for at LEAST 50 years.

These are some early photos of our house showing what most likely started a trend of deterioration of the soft red brick and limestone mortar.

These are photos of our biggest problem spots around the house before work was commenced. All of this was noticeably and rapidly deteriorating the first few years of owning the house which led us to the dire decision of making the expensive repairs before it was too late.

Here are the materials that were ordered in. Limestone mortar mix to match our original from Chicago, the mortar dye to create our various mortar colors to spot match areas, and some of the scaffolding. Not shown is the 40-foot lift they brought in as well.

Here are some action shots while the work was going on. This is where my anxiety went through the roof! the entire front porch had to be dug out and reset and EVERY joint was cut to allow for the expansion and shifting to lift everything back into place.

This was the MAJOR issue created due to the negligent lift driver. They are reassembling the wall that he accidentally tore off of the porch creating a mess and tons of re-work for the crew.

Here is how the pink limestone detail repairs were looking during the work. It looked amazing to have all of the broken details repaired to the original grandeur.

YAY! Another major in the books and something that shouldn’t (knock on wood) have to be completed again in my lifetime!

ALL DONE and on to the next one!