Let’s talk about Vinyl windows for a short moment. The situation is much the same with vinyl windows as it is with PVC trim. Vinyl windows initially sound like the answer to all of your questions. Let’s say I have this old home with century old windows that probably haven’t been touched in over 30 years. They don’t work so great, they look a little rough, and they need regular maintenance. Vinyl windows have none of those issues. Once they are installed, they look good enough, function good enough, and have zero maintenance. Problem solved. Phew.

Now we fast forward 10 years. Does the situation look so good? Not likely. The function has likely already diminished, some glass may be fogging up, and you want to change the color scheme of your house but are stuck with that awful white vinyl window.

If we continue on another 10 years, you are likely now forced to consider replacing those vinyl windows. Soon enough you will be tossing your 20 year old vinyl windows in a landfill on top of your old 100 year old windows. If you had not tossed your original windows in the trash, they would have lasted indefinitely. They need maintenance, yes, but the amount of time you can get away with neglecting maintenance on them is likely longer than the full life of the vinyl saviors you so coveted. The large majority of the windows we work on have not been cared for in 30-50 years with no detrimental effect.

Polyvinyl Chloride in any form just doesn’t bring to the table everything you had hoped it would. It also leaves an awful mess behind it. So here are just 5 reasons to avoid the temptation to use PVC on your old home.

1. Most Installers don’t know how to Install it Properly. Carpenters are often the folks installing your exterior trim. Carpenters work with wood, or at least that is how it started. PVC is not wood. If you deal with PVC like you do wood there can be major problems. Wood expands in width (across the grain) and not very much in length. PVC expends in length. A lot. expansion and contraction can create major gaps in improperly installed PVC trim. These gaps often put more stress on the caulk filling them than it can handle and the seal breaks. This allows water in. Even though PVC does not rot or encourage mold growth, I can assure you that everything behind it, from the sheething to the studs and drywall most certainly do when they get wet.
2. PVC gets very Hot. Why does that matter? Although PVC takes paint just fine that doesn’t mean it will look good painted, particularly a dark color. A dark paint will make the trim even hotter and expand even more. It will certainly start to cook that paint off far sooner than you had hoped and you will likely see white lines where joints between boards failed. If you read the product literature on PVC trim you will find that they advise you to not paint their product a dark color.
3. PVC does not absorb moisture. Yes, this is a positive thing in many ways but it also can be harmful. First, your paint takes a good deal longer to fully cure because paint was built with the expectation to have wood absorbing some of the moisture. Full cure on PVC takes up to 30 days; full cure on wood trim is usually half that time. That is a very large window for things to go wrong. Second, any moisture that does get behind it has no way to get out. Wood trim would be able to absorb small amounts of moisture from behind and release it to the exterior with no harm done. If there was more than a small amount that is getting in the wood trim would certainly absorb that and rot can happen. But you would also be warned before the problem got out of hand. The paint would quickly begin to fail in that area and you essentially be notified that something bad is going on. PVC would do no such thing. It would continue to look pristine while rot is devouring your sheathing and framing.
4. PVC doesn’t break down and is one of the least recyclable materials out there. Once it is produced it is pretty much here to stay. Let’s just pretend that the trim installed on your house stay there forever. What about the cut-offs? They will go to a landfill and stay there forever, slowly leaking harmful dioxins into the environment. What about all of the PVC sawdust? Same thing. Meanwhile, if you used wood, the cutoffs don’t have to have the same outcome. I have brought them home to throw in my wood burning stove many times. I have regularly used our wood sawdust in my compost and mulch. Our local lumber yard sends their sawdust off to local farms for animal bedding and floor covering.
5. The production of PVC is extremely bad for the environment. The dioxins released during production are some of the most toxic chemicals out there. The level of harm that these chemicals can do is quite high. According to the EPA, there is no safe level of dioxin for humans or other animals. Further, they assert that the levels in humans and children is already high enough to present health problems. What about wood? Oh yeah, it spends its pre-lumber life as a tree. Producing oxygen. Sucking up CO2.

I’m not one to put my personal opinions out there too much. Particularly when it comes to my customers, it is not my opinion that will be of any use to them but my knowledge and expertise. But this opinion will not come as a shock to anyone so I will just put it out there. I. Hate. Vinyl. Okay, hate is a strong word and I do not completely hate it. As the saying goes, I like my music vinyl and my windows wood. Other than it’s contribution to music, I find vinyl repugnant.

(Even so many people may not know this fun fact: the earliest records were actually made of Shellac, one of my favorite building materials. You could actually break pieces off, dissolve them in some alcohol, and put a nice finish on some furniture. No surprise this shift from a sustainable and healthy option to harmful and carcinogenic happened in the 1940’s. Right around the time most everything in the building industry and consumer products in general took the same quality and environmental impact nosedive.)

It comes as no surprise to anyone considering our line of business that I loathe vinyl windows. But are windows the only place that we find vinyl? Nope. I think most people don’t realize the full name of vinyl: Polyvinyl Chloride or PVC. Yup, it was right there all along. PVC and vinyl are one and the same.

We’ve become accustomed to the PVC pipes in our buildings. Apparently we don’t mind hearing the splash of water every time someone flushes a toilet. Though anyone that has tried to sleep in the bottom floor of a home with PVC pipe may feel differently. If you are building a home with bedrooms on the first floor, please do them a favor and run them some blissfully silent cast iron.

Now we are seeing PVC all over the exteriors of our homes. Not only that, it is being pitched as a, gulp, “Green” option. So I’m just going to come out and say it: There is nothing Green about vinyl. Ever. It is one of the most harmful products ever created and if the producers and users of the material bore the full cost to society of it, the price would be worse than prohibitive. Check out our next post, Five Reason to Avoid PVC

By: Julian Lane

Your roof is meant to protect your home from experiencing the elements. However, things like age, clogged gutters, and poorly installed skylights can leave you with a puddle of water on the living room floor. Do you know what to do in case of a roof leak? Keep reading for tips on how to get through this unwelcome turn of events.

Immediately

As soon as you discover a drip from overhead, it’s time to get to work figuring out what, exactly, caused it. Head to the garage and grab your ladder. Unless the issue is obvious from the ground, you will have to get on top of the roof for a quick inspection. Look for things like missing flashing, broken shingles, or other damage. KTM Roofing in Atlanta suggests taking a quick peek for potentially slippery spots and wearing boots with traction-enhanced soles.

Next, stop the leak. A tarp works well as a temporary barrier until you can contact your roofing company to repair the damage. Keep in mind, however, that if it is still raining, repairs can wait. It is never in your best interest to stand on your roof during a rainstorm. If you have to wait (or if you were not around when the leak started), you may already have carpet and furniture that is too saturated to salvage. Look for a junk removal service to haul away these and other water-logged items, including mattresses and appliances. Remember, mold can start growing within 48 hours on wet carpet and upholstery; your home and health will be better off by moving it out the door as soon as possible.

After the Emergency

By now, you should have called your insurance agent to report the damage. They can advise you on what is covered and what is not. Regardless of what your insurer will pay for, your next priority is to fix the damage permanently. You do not have to use the first roofing company you find online, and contrary to popular belief, your insurance company cannot tell you who to use. Make a point to get multiple quotes, asking for licenses and insurance papers from each one. Ask about their inspection process; you will want to ensure they fix not only the visible damage but also any rotted or water-damaged wood that’s not visible.

For the Future

In an ideal world, you will only have to suffer one incident of roof damage and its related — and unfortunate — flooding. But what you do moving forward determines whether this is a one-off incident or a perpetual problem. Make a point to check the shingles, flashings, and pipe collars periodically. Even if you get a brand-new roof, these quick visual inspections can prevent another disaster. Also, trim any tree branches that are close enough to touch your roof in the breeze. Get Busy Gardening asserts that you can do this on your own with a few simple tools.

One of the most effective ways to prevent future damage is also one of the easiest: simply clean your gutters and downspouts. It’s not a bad idea to check these once every few weeks during the fall and winter because leaves, acorns, and other debris can collect and form a clog, which can then lead to everything from ice dams to a flooded basement and foundation issues.

To summarize, your first step is to remove anything that could cause mold. Next, fix the damage and then prioritize roof maintenance in the future. There is nothing fun about water damage. Unfortunately, as a homeowner, you will experience problems with your roof at some point. It is always best if you know ahead of time what to do so you are not caught completely unaware.

Image via Pexels

The examples we are working with here cover one of our most common situations that call for this type pf repair.  The customer had an old door that they wanted to change the style and location of the handle-set hardware.  The large hole that is left from the old set is way larger than epoxy could ever handle.  In addition, often the new location is just slightly off of the original location, which again calls for something a bit more robust.

As you will see in these photos, there is no need to have a full width patch.  In fact, you need it to be less thick than the piece you are working on so that you have a base to set and glue it into.  My go-to patch thickness is 1/2″.  The first step is simply deciding the rough size of the patch you intend to use.  You want it to be big enough that it will have nice glue adhesion but any bigger and it will just require more work or possibly compromise the stability of the original piece.

Once the size is decided, you need to find a piece of wood to use as a patch.  It is always best to use the same species of wood as the original piece.  If that is not an option, shooting for a wood of similar properties should suffice.  In the example here, the patch is poplar and the door is eastern white pine.  The properties of both of these woods is close enough.  We just need woods that have similar expansion and contraction qualities.  With your patch piece picked out, you now can cut it down to the size you want the patch to be.  Be sure to have the directions of the wood grains match.  I know it may seem strange cutting the patch before you cut the hole but it is in fact easiest to fit the hole to the patch rather than the patch to the hole.

Now you will just trace the patch outline over the hole or area that you intend to patch.  With that done, we now need to set the depth of the router to just short of the thickness of the repair piece.  Then you can carefully use the router to remove the material up to the lines you marked.  If your patch is particularly thick you may need to do this in 2 passes with the first at half depth.  With most of the material removed, you can then finish it off with a chisel to clear the corners and fine tune the fit.  Warning:  As you are testing your patch only lightly fit it into the hole or else you may not be able to get it back out without causing damage.

When you are confident with a good fit, get a nice coat of wood glue on all mating surfaces and set the repair in.  Now you can force it in place if you need to.  As always a clamp or two should be used to hold the repair tight in place as the glue sets.  Wipe away any excess glue and walk away.  Once the glue has set up, you can remove the clamps and sand down the repair to a flush finish.  If you have any gaps around the perimeter these can be filled with epoxy or wood filler.  Dutchman complete!

This is one of those repairs that the cost is all in the labor.  The costs of the repair materials are nothing compared to the time and expertise involved to perform the task.  This is a fairly intricate task to achieve well and efficiently.  But once you have some practice it will become second nature.  Even better, if you tend to be performing the same approximate sized repairs you can build jigs that can all but take the guesswork out of it.  You would have one jig that cuts the patch to a specific size.  Then you would have another jig that guides the router to an exact matching hole.  This is a much quicker and more effective way to do it.  But if you just have one patch to do, the time required to make the jig is more than it takes to do the actual repair in the first place.  As great as the jig option is, I feel it is always important for people to know how to do it the old school (okay, Hard) way before they take the short cut.  Then they are able to appreciate and value the skills of the craft as well as the value of the crafty shortcut of the jig.  If you just started with the jig they would never respect it like they would or should.  Okay, I will get off my soapbox now and let you go patch some wood.  Have fun!

Top Tricks of Window Restoration

Despite the fact that people have been working on old windows for many years, when we started out there was a dearth of information on how to actually do so.  Over the years we have tried things many different things.  Some methods and materials are more effective than others.  Sometimes unpredictably so.  Nevertheless, there are a few things we have learned along the way that remain constant.  This is a list of the top 5 most valuable tools and materials that we use every day as we restore historic wood windows.  Without them, I can confidently say that there would be a whole lot more cussing in our shop.

1. Steambox!  It all starts here.  This is the workhorse.  If you do not have one of these and you have any desires to enjoy the task of restoring windows, you must get one.  There of course are some very expensive ones out there like the fantastic one produced by Bagala Window Works, called The Steam Stripper.  It is not really something a DIY person can afford but for a serious restoration shop it will pay for itself.  However, that is not the only option.  You can make your own using materials found at your local hardware or home supply for under $200 (not including the steam machine, which could set you back another $200 brand new).  A well built DIY box will pay for itself 10 fold.  At our shop, we have built at least a half dozen boxes.  Our current box, built with stainless steel sheet metal, hopefully will be our last.

The steambox is the single best way to soften and remove the old hard putty holding the glass in place.  As a result, there is far less glass breakage.  In addition, most paint is easily removed from the wood surfaces.  On top of all of this the steam is the cleanest and safest way to remove materials containing lead.  So, yeah this thing is the bomb.

2. Whiting Powder:  This is an item that always seems to be overlooked on how valuable it is.  It is simply a chalk like powder that we use to clean the oils from the glazing putty from the glass.  It also helps start the curing process of the finished glazing.  When you finish tooling the putty on a window, you simply brush this onto the glass like you are dusting for finger prints and it will magically remove all of the finger prints from the glass.  This used to be a common material found at hardware stores but now it can be difficult to find.  Don’t even think about the big box stores.  To give an idea of the value of this, recently we ran out of whiting and we halted all glazing work until it was replenished.  Life without it just isn’t desirable.

3.  Quality Glazing Putty:  Since we are on the topic of glazing let’s not overlook the actual putty.  A good quality glazing putty tools well, cures fairly quickly, and maintains the seal and elasticity for a while.  The one we swear by is produced by Sarco Putty Company.  The glazing putty you will find at most hardware stores and home centers do not fall into the quality category in my mind. Do not succumb to reaching for the low hanging fruit.  You will regret it.

4. Glazier’s Hammer and Point Driver:  These are two specialized tools for this specific trade.  The point driver quickly and easily sets the glazing points into the rabbets holding the glass in place.  Depending on the window, the wood may be a bit too hard for the gun to set the points as deep as you need.  That is where the Glazier’s hammer comes in.  It has a flat face that sits flush to the glass and allows you to tap the point into the wood deeper.  These tools combined will increase the speed of finishing windows as well as reduce glass breakage a bit.

5.  Wood Epoxy:  This stuff is pretty much what puts the restore in restoration.  These old windows have been around for a while and there is no doubt that there will be some knicks, dings, and damage.  With a good quality epoxy you can fill and rebuild parts of the windows to make them look like new.  Without epoxy, our windows wouldn’t even look half as nice as they do.  We also would be spending so much more time replacing items such as sills and muntins without epoxy.

These are not the only items that we consider invaluable but they by far have the most impact on our day to day restoration process.  Even for a homeowner taking on the restoration of your own windows, all of these items should be in your arsenal.

Things are a bit crazy in the world right now. With malicious viruses sweeping their way through our lives it is hard not to feel helpless. It is times like these that remind me how I started in the window restoration business in the first place. Living in a house with old windows that were in desperate need of repair and no knowledge to do so, I felt a bit helpless. For me then, as it still is now, seeking out the knowledge and skills I lack is the best way to ease my mind.

Like many in our area right now, I find myself with a little time to kill at home. My time killer of choice today is to do another round of seasoning my cast iron pans. Ever since reading and following Sheryl Canter’s Blog and the Cook’s Illustrated coverage of her cast iron pan seasoning method, I have cooked my fried eggs on my skillet without any problems. I highly recommend cooking with cast iron in general. If any of you watched the Dark Waters Film this past year you may now know the risks of non-stick pans. (Okay, if we are going to continue to head on tangents here, you should also check out the documentary The Devil We Know, which covers the same story and is on Netflix. Both movies are great ways to spend your time as you shelter in place) Luckily you can naturally achieve a non-stick surface if you follow this method of seasoning your pans. I warn you it takes some time to do it right but that is one thing most of us have in excess right now.

So now we can get onto the heart of this post: The Flax plant. The flax plant is one of the most useful plants in human history. The oil that I use to season my skillets is Flaxseed oil. At work, we use linseed oil to pre-treat wood and linseed oil is a major ingredient in oil glazing putty and some oil paints. Guess what? Linseed oil and flaxseed oil are one and the same. They are the oil that is derived from the flax seed. For the most part it seems the only real difference is that we tend to call the oil we use for cooking and eating flaxseed and we refer to the oil we use in home improvement and painting as linseed oil.

The oils from the seeds are not even this plant’s most significant contribution to humanity. The textile called linen is derived from the fibers of this plant. It seems that linen is the source for the alternate name for the seeds being called linseeds (linoleum is also a product derived from this seed and the name has the same source). No matter what you call it, humans have been using the fibers of the flax plant for a crazy long time. Textiles using flax fibers have been found dating as far back as 30,000 years.

Linseed oil has been used as a binder in paints for hundreds of years. It is the chemical properties of the oil that make it so attractive. It is applied and flows like an oil but it dries (technically oxidizes) to a solid form. In its solid form it still remains somewhat pliable and also fairly hydrophobic, which is why it functions so well in paints and putties. That also explains why it seasons my cast iron pans so well.

As with everything, there is a downside to linseed oil. It is highly flammable and is know to spontaneously combust. Care must be taken when working with linseed oil to avoid this undesirable event. Store linseed oils and paints in metal cabinets. For rags that have the oil on them, we lay them out flat on the ground far from combustible materials and place them in a metal container when they have dried.

Knowing what a fantastically useful plant the flax is, it made me wonder if I should plant my own flax plants just in case I need to produce my own oil and linen. The answer to that question was a clear yes to planting this in my garden. It has a surprisingly pretty blue flower. Though it would ease my mind knowing I have the plant out there in case I need to make my own linseed oil and linen, I read about all that goes into both processes and I have moved on from that fantasy. Things aren’t that bad…

At the start of the summer of 2019, we were fortunate enough to begin work on the exteriors of the windows at Mount Pleasant Mansion in Fairmount Park. It is a beautiful Georgian style home that was built in 1761. At the time it was built it was one of the finest homes in the Philadelphia area. Over 250 years later, it is still quite an impressive home.

The original owner was a pirate; OK well technically he was a privateer, which is really just a government sanctioned pirate. It is a matter of perspective what you call him then I suppose. But if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck…

About 20 years after it’s construction, the notorious Benedict Arnold purchased the home. It seems he was quite busy turning coats at the time and never found the time or funds to actually move in. His plot was discovered not much more than a year after the purchase of this fine mansion.

Now on to the most important part of this home’s history. In 2019, the world renowned restoration company know as Iconic Windows was hired to restore and preserve the exteriors of the historic windows of the main building. The Philadelphia area was in a frenzy at the news of the Iconic crews’ arrival. Even security had to be brought in. Not surprisingly, the Iconic Windows crew deftly restored the windows back to their original splendor.

This was such a fun project and we were so grateful to be involved. The weather could not have been better for it. We even had a nice surprise high atop one of the Palladian windows. Looks like someone named James etched his name into one of the glass panes. What a fun find! Sorry James but we just blew up your spot.

What I want to talk about today is wood of course.  More specifically I would like to discuss the proper treatment of old wood in prepping for a durable painted finish.

As with all painting tasks, understanding your substrate is the first step in choosing your finishing approach.  You should approach metal different than you do wood.  That seems obvious.  However, even most pros don’t realize that different types of woods also require different approaches.  The “type” of wood that we are most concerned with today is old wood.  As historic restoration contractors, we work primarily with wood that is at least 80 years old.  We have come to realize that old wood must be approached differently than new lumber if you want to have a quality finish.

Before we start talking about what you need to do, let’s delve a bit into wood and how it ages.  Wood is a fantastically resilient material.  It can last essentially forever if a few simple conditions are met.  It must be protected from the sun and it must avoid prolonged periods of moisture saturation.  Most people think that water rots wood.  However, water on its own does not hurt the wood at all.  It is in fact fungus that causes all rot and fungus requires a certain amount of moisture in order to survive.  If the moisture content in the wood is below 20% the majority of the time, with the ability to dry out when it rises above that, then the wood will never rot because the fungus does not have a chance to grow.

Quick tangent:  I always find it funny when we work on windows from the early 1900’s.  Up until that time, standard practice in building windows was to assemble the window parts, drill a hole through the tenons, and insert a wooden peg to hold the joint together.  At the turn of the century, metal fasteners were becoming cheaper and easier to acquire for builders and they started using steel nails instead of wooden pegs.  Now 100 years later, we are finding something interesting.  The metal nails are failing.  They are often completely or at least mostly corroded yet the wood surrounding them is still perfectly sound.  The moisture content in the wood was harmless to the wood but the “mighty” iron crumbled under it, literally.  All of those fantastic homes from the colonial period wouldn’t still be standing if they were held together with steel nails.  Food for thought.

So we know we need to keep the wood from getting wet for prolonged periods but there is another enemy to deal with:  the sun.  The sun, and it’s UV rays in particular, will also damage wood.  The lignin in the wood cells is damaged by UV light in a process called photo-oxidation.  Lignin is what gives the cell walls in wood it’s strength.  As the lignin in the cells degrades, cracks develop in the wood.  These cracks allow surface water a place to get in.  In addition, since the cell walls are compromised they are now more absorbent.  Now the surface of the wood starts absorbing water like it is the end grain.  Moisture content in the wood will begin to rise and the wood is now more amenable to fungus growth.

Clearly, the takeaway is that you want to protect your wood from the UV rays of the sun and high levels of moisture content.  The obvious choice here is paint.  There are a number of clear finishes that can perform well but nothing can compare to paint.  A quality paint job will block almost all UV rays and keep the moisture from getting into the wood.

So the question now isn’t if we should paint the wood but how do we keep the paint from failing.  We can get into the details of a quality paint job in another post where we discuss paint prep, primers, and paints.  Today we will just focus on one particular step that is often required when dealing with old wood that is not required with new wood.  After 100 years, it is safe to assume that the wood was not always perfectly protected from the elements.  It is highly likely that various sections spent some time unprotected or poorly protected from the elements.  Thus, there has probably been at least some UV damage to the wood.  If you do not address this you may run into problems.

As was mentioned earlier, as the lignin in the wood cells is degraded it becomes more absorbent and sponge-like.  This presents a problem when it comes to priming and painting the damaged wood.  New wood will very lightly absorb the primer, which is great for getting good adhesion, but it will mostly sit on the surface to cure.  The UV damaged wood however will try to absorb every last bit of liquid it can until the damaged wood cells are full or the liquid runs out.  The problem is that primers are a delicate mix of solids and liquids.  The liquids are there essentially to help the solids assemble and cure properly.  All paints recommend you to not paint when temperatures are too high or in direct sunlight.  That is because if they dry too quickly the paint or primer will not have enough time to cure properly.  The same thing is happening when you paint the old damaged wood.  The wood will suck up all of the liquids and leave all of the solids on the surface.  It is like trying to use a colander as a soup bowl.

If anyone has ever had a section of wood on their home (usually in a high sun exposure location)that they just cannot keep the paint from peeling on no matter how good they prep it, this is probably what is happening to you.  The biggest problem is that you really can’t tell if wood was damaged or not by looking at it.  Nevertheless there is a simple way to deal with it.  There is a pre-treatment that you must do to the wood prior to priming.  What we use on windows in our shop and we call our “sealer” is really a consolidating oil-resin that we make ourselves.  Historically, painters would use a 50/50 mix of linseed oil and turpentine as their recipe and that still works fine.  Since there are some concerns that recipe may be a bit susceptible to fungus growth, we use a 50/50 mix of mineral spirits and an alkyd oil instead.  The oil we use is usually the product know as Penetrol, which is sold as an oil paint additive and conditioner.  We simply brush this sealer onto the bare wood.  This is when you will find out if the wood was damaged.  If it was damaged you will see the wood absorb the sealer as soon as you brush it.  If it wasn’t damaged you will see it sit on the surface of the wood.  When you encounter sections that are sucking up the sealer, just keep brushing it on until it stops absorbing it (or until you give up).  After you give the sealer a bit of time to dry, you can move to priming and painting as you would any other wood.  It’s that simple.

If you perform this one simple step every time you encounter some old wood that may have been damaged by UV rays you could avoid a lot of aggravation and considerably extend the life of your paint job.  The devil is in the details.  Sadly, this is a detail that even most high class pros aren’t aware of but now you are!

Last fall we started working on a project at Haverford College.  They were planning on renovating and re-purposing their old Ryan Gymnasium.  We were hired to restore all of the existing original windows in the building as well as build a few custom windows to match the original windows exactly. It is now a year later and the project is complete.  We are so glad to have been a part of this project and are very proud of our contribution to the project.  Let’s take a quick look at what was done.

The building was originally built around 1900 as a gymnasium.  On the main floor was the basketball court and main gym floor.  A floor above wrapped around the perimeter of the building was a wood running track.  In the basement at one point, there was a swimming pool.  The pool was at some point filled in and the basement was mostly just locker rooms.  Up until the start of this project, surprisingly few changes were made to the gym.

With newer gym facilities elsewhere on campus, the old gym no longer served a purpose.  So the college decided to convert it to an arts building.  Many changes needed to be made in the process.  Fortunately, the folks at Haverford College understand the value of preservation and they were determined to preserve as much of the historic character of the building as possible.  One part of that was to restore the old windows in the building.  They wanted them to look just like they did when the building first opened.  And that we did!

We removed every window in the building and restored them back at our shop.  All paint and glazing was removed from the windows and all glass was saved and reused.  Most of the windows were large 18 over 18 double hung windows.  There also were some massive 38 over 24 double hung windows.  The upper sash alone was over 8 feet tall!  The windows were a lot of work but they certainly were worth it.  Check out the restored windows on our Portfolio Page

This project also required us to build 7 custom new wood windows to match the existing windows in all respects.  Since the project was a LEED certified project, we were required to use FSC certified lumber for the windows, which left us using poplar.  We built every part of the window sashes and window jambs and casings in our shop in Bryn Mawr.  The window sashes are exact matches of the originals with true through mortise and tenon joints and the exact same muntin profile.  They came out great.  Take a look at a couple photo galleries of the replicated wood windows on our Portfolio Page

This was a really fun project.  It is rare to work on a large construction project and have them value the work that we do as much as they did on this project.  So I would like to express my gratitude to the guys at Whiting-Turner that were managing this project and all of the smart people at Haverford College that had the foresight to know and trust that our services were worth it.  Thank you!

Many of us love the old wavy glass we find in our old windows.  However, we often have a hard time finding old glass to replace the broken panes in our windows.  Often this leads to an all too common act that most of us old house lovers and owners don’t like to admit we do:  dumpster diving.

The first few times you do it, you may have a rush of adrenaline and the thrill of it can be exciting.  Even your righteous self will gladly justify that you are sacrificing for the good of the planet, your home, neighborhood, [insert other token excuse here].  It will even leave you with a strange sense of accomplishment.  Embrace the thrill while it lasts; it is a sort of right of passage really.  There was really no avoiding it.  But one day the glow of adventure may wear off.  That day you may come to realize that you are just a guy in a dumpster.

This post is to remind people that there are often alternatives.  In this case, new glass made to look like the old glass can be purchased.  It is expensive for sure.  But it just may be worth it to not have to climb in a dirty dumpster ever again.