Day One, Revisited I know I wrote that a year and a half ago, but now that the restoration is (almost) over and the innkeeping has begun, it seems just as appropriate today. Our first guests were a couple from Philadelphia just looking to get away on a Friday night. The sheets had arrived that […]
Category Archives: Speedwell Forge – restoration project
The week after I thought the grand opening meant we were done. I’m not sure how I can still be so naive after everything else we’ve gone through, but I think that eternal optimism is one of my charms. Of course, that may just be me being optimistic… I’d forgotten about all the crystal and […]
The end of the beginning The building code inspector came out on Monday for the “final” visit and flagged us for a dozen issues, from a broken emergency light (which we knew about) to all of the shower lines being reversed (which we didn’t know about). Dawn has taken care of everything and so we […]
Grand Opening! The moment you’ve been waiting for — I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves:
Coming together Wow. In two days, the painting is finished, the duct work is finished, the kitchen island is finished, the locks are finished, the windows are finished, and the shutters are almost finished. (I was responsible for those, which is why they are behind schedule.) The walkway will be finished tomorrow at 6am, the […]
Down to the wire One week remaining… Saturday Buy coffee maker Install new mailbox Order sheets and towels Find (or order) window pulls Order one more kitchen pull Schedule clock guy Buy bathroom hardware (towel racks, etc.) Sunday Set up walkway, lay wood chips Unpack boxes, organize furniture Invite neighbors Set up canopy bed on […]
Independence Day First, the good news: Last week’s record rainfall did NOT do any significant damage to the mansion. Had it occurred a week earlier, when the driveway was freshly paved, I would not be saying that. Dawn, however, did not sleep for three days. When you’re sleeping in a greenhouse with a plastic roof, […]
A sign Last October, Dawn and I spent a solid week working on a street sign, but we didn’t like any of our designs. We finally met with a signmaker, but we didn’t like his designs, either. Frustrated, we shelved the whole thing until…now. We’ve been using the mansion as our logo, but it didn’t […]
Paymaster’s Office I think the Paymaster’s Office is the second coolest building on the property. (The coolest, of course, is the privy.) But you can’t live in the privy, and you don’t get all of these other benefits: The paymaster window. How many other buildings are divided by a wall with a double-hung window? The basement, […]
Todd Auker I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: The people on this project have been fantastic. Todd is no exception. I’m not sure how Dawn found him, but it was a last minute thing, and he had to squeeze us into his schedule. (Which meant he would do one room, disappear for […]