Renovating to Restore: Ridiculous Adventures Repairing the (amazing!) Borden Milk House in Wassaic NY
We spent another night at the house (after a great time at The Wassaic Project's summer benefit). The next day my partner worked on the floor (which should have been the topic of this post), and we made coffee, did dishes, washed hands... lots of things involving sink water. At some point (unfortunately not immediately) … Continue reading The Water (redux)
For the record, I have been reusing that straw for months. June was historic: it marked our first overnight stay at our amazing, beautiful house. Which meant, I could finally enjoy a relaxing alcoholic beverage at home.* With the toilet flushable, we said goodbye to hotels an hour away and hello to the unfortunate wood … Continue reading The First Night.
The world was a different place in 1870 - in most ways it was terrible. Women had practically no rights, racism was even more rampant than today (slavery had just been abolished, on paper), and residential indoor plumbing was pretty rare.* Life wasn't too bad (comparably) if you were a land-owning white male, but decidedly … Continue reading The Metalwork.
A bit off topic (not really), I wanted to highlight some of the amazing things we love about Wassaic, NY. Almost every weekend we've been working on the house, we've discovered some amazing new side of this awesome little town.* We all loved the house as soon as Zillow sent it to me in a … Continue reading #keepwassaicweird
It's amazing what running water will do for morale. It almost makes it like a real house! But I'm getting way ahead of myself. Nick (with the flame) and his colleague (I'm so sorry, I forget your name!!!) fixing the first of... a few... broken pipes The day after the electric was turned on, a … Continue reading The Water.
As mentioned (2 or 3 million times), we bought the house sans inspections. One of the most promising aspects was the electric: it looked new-ish; the house had a new meter; generally the wiring looked pretty good (there was no knob & tube wiring, for example). The house's distinct lack of walls gave us easy … Continue reading The Electric.
