Another Historic Treasure

Just days after I posted about the historic Gay House (here) a friend started talking about another amazing old house in Montgomery that hubby and I actually looked at a lifetime ago, the Winter House.

The story goes that there is a tunnel that was used to escape Wilson’s raiders that leads from the basement to the river.

 The old grainy photo is from some ancient files that I dug up but take some time to examine this glorious structure. Notice the unusual balustrade around the porch and the trim detail between the columns. It looks like a key hole. See it? I love that charming little window over the front door. Steve Mouzon you need to jump in here with some more interesting info on this house.

 And speaking of front doors does it get any better than this? I want them.

 I know. It makes me cry also. Check out those corbels. How many must there be in all????? And by the way this is how shutters are SUPPOSED to be used. Have you ever seen the vinyl version that some builder stuck on a building BACKWARDS!  Please.

Love, love, love those fish scale shingles and that awesome window.

Southern Accents you might be headed back to town.

If you want to say, That was fun!” at the end of your project contact me at

www.cindybarganier.com.

 

Tile

There are so many beautiful options on the market for tile today that you could literally spend weeks trying to decide what to use. Unfortunately some of the options will seriously date your house so you have to think long-term when choosing the hard surfaces for a home. I tend to stay pretty classic but that doesn’t mean you have to be boring.

For instance the tile used for this master bath is a very sophisticated (some might even say sexy) product called textile that I found at Jenkins Brick.

It looks like the walls are covered with linen and comes in a nice range of colors. We used the 12 x 24 size with a staggered joint installation.

We wanted a very clean contemporary look so we kept the joints as small as possible and matched the grout to the “linen” lines as closely as we could (which also means less grout to clean). The tub by Victoria and Albert is a freestanding white work of art. It hasn’t been installed yet and I can’t wait to see it.

There are some tricks of the trade you can use to achieve a great custom look while using very reasonably priced in- stock tiles. For the childrens’ shower we used Antares Platinum (at an average cost of $3.60 sf) in various sizes and directions to accomplish a much more expensive look. The bottom 3/4 of the wall is done in 20″ x 20″ squares run straight. On top of this is a border of 4″ x 4″ tiles that mirror tiles on the floor. The top section is finished with 13″ x 13″ tiles run on the diagonal. The feel is that of tumbled marble without the price tag.

 

Short on space? Have your tile mason make a raised ledge out of your marble or granite. It is just big enough to hold a lovely silver shaving kit or a bar of soap and frees up the real counter. You have to carefully select your faucets though to make sure you have enough room to raise and lower the drain stopper. We didn’t think about adding the ledge until after the fact so we had to swap out the fixtures.

 Tomorrow is your last chance to sign up for the give away. Go here and scroll down to “Give Away!”  to find the rules on how to be entered in the drawing. If you are already registered but would like to better your chances get a friend to subscribe to the this blog; shoot me an email  (cindybarg@knology.net) telling me that they are your contact and your name goes in TWO MORE TIMES!

If you want to say, “That was fun!” at the end of your project contact me at www.cindybarganier.com.

 

 

Related articles

• Extra Large Subway Tile in the Bathroom (apartmenttherapy.com)

More Progress

We just completed the mid-May inspection of the Florida house. It is so exciting  to arrive after a 3-4 week absence and see the progress.  Have I told you how much I LOVE this builder? This trip was all about color, tile and light placement.

I was so pleased with the results of the whitewashing and glazing. We used a Benjamin Moore semi-transparent deck stain, cutting its color to 50% for use on the wall boards. The color, “Ashland Slate,” has a grey-green undertone. I will talk more about the process that we went through to arrive at the cabinet color in a later post. Color selection for this house was extremely tricky.

Notice also the addition of the ceiling beams. If you remember from the first post, the plans called for a painted, coffered ceiling the same as every other house in the neighborhood. To add character and visual weight to this room we wrapped the beams in a veneer of antique pine. What a difference!

  The next change (remember, proportion is king) was to run the flooring horizontally and not vertically. This meant that the boards would now visually expand the width of the room. You have to be careful with long rectangular rooms. Vertical floor boards can make them feel like bowling alleys.

 This changed allowed us  to add a lovely border around the perimeter of the room as a bespoke feature. Didn’t the floor guys do a fabulous job with that radius around the stairs! When it’s time to choose rug sizes start inside this border and come off 6″ so that you don’t cover it up.

Stay tuned!

And if you haven’t registered for the give away go here scroll down to Give Away! and follow the directions. 

To say, “That was fun!” at the end of your project contact me at www.cindybarganier.com