Window Restoration
When we decided to become the new stewards of an old house, we were really excited by the original features the house has retained since 1920. This includes the wood windows. Over the past 4 years, we've scoffed at all suggestions from friends and relatives with modern homes to replace them with "Energy-Efficient" vinyl windows.
This year, we've finally started tackling the window restoration project (actually 28 projects if you count the individual windows). The 3 initial windows were done as a joint project... now the rest have become Michele's project. Michele's "get this done before thinking of having a baby" project.
So far the six casement windows in the breakfast nook/office are DONE!!!
My work space. Notice dogs sleeping away... unaware of all the work that needs to be done.
Tip: Heat Gun is great for loosening old screws.
Window that has been stripped, sanded, and primed.
Each window takes about 2 1/2 weeks to complete. So it will only take me a year to get it all done. ARGH!!!
3 comments:
Glad to see you found the glazing compound in the tube. It's much, much easier than the old tub of compound. I really like the look of old, restored windows too. I was going to redo all of mine this summer had I not moved away and put the house on the market. Bullet dodged?!? At any rate, I say boo vinyl!!!
Totally agree - stick to your guns on the old windows! We have many of our own to work on, but haven't had a chance to get started on it yet (and with how long we take to complete a project, it will probably have to wait until spring at this point). Enjoyed seeing your progress, and the bathroom looks fabulous.
The old windows are so lovely. If you can avoid vinyl windows, by all means do so! I read somewhere in one of the house blogs that they skirted the issue of "energy efficient" by getting some old windows that matched the size of the ones that they were restoring and fixed it so that there were two windows -- one on the inside and one on the outside that created a space in between them just like vinyl windows have. I don't remember exactly how they did it, but I'm assuming it will work (it was a Michigan blog, so it would definitely have to work here!). What do you think about that idea?
p.s. Hi, Nate!
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