Fireplace Stripping - Take 2

Ive started stripping the paint off the fireplace in the bedroom - basically a repeat procedure of what we did to the living room fireplace. It looks like a bit of a mess now, but you can see how all the detail comes up when we remove all the paint.

Paint, Dry, Rotate, Repeat

We decided when we first moved in to strip all our doors back to the bare wood to get off all the uneven layers of chipped paint and reveal the crisp panel edges once again. After sanding and filling the doors we had to give them four coats of paint each side including a primer and basecoat. Multiply that by 2 sides and by 4 doors and that's 32 coats of paint! Here is the process documented for our bedroom door - the very last door.

Shelving - Step 3

The weather has been gorgeous this weekend (sunny and 25C) so we've been a bit lazy with the flat renovations. We did however manage to get all 4 living room shelves constructed. Here is a photo of one installed in place. There is a bit of sanding to do, but then we will take them to Camberwell Paintworks to get them sprayed so they have a high quality durable finish.

Thank you Cindy!

Thanks Cindy for our sweet housewarming snow globe and for the memories it brings of a snowy Chicago.

xo J

Project Main Door - Before, During & After

We're still waiting for the new locks to arrive from allgood, but here is our new flat entrance door and hallway just about finished after almost 2 months of work. As the door was new, we decided to make it a taller flush panel door and paint it a light grey to contrast with the original doors and make the hallway seem higher. We also moved the door over by a few inches so it doesnt swing into the living room anymore.

Thank you Philippa!

Thanks Philippa for our lovely housewarming gift - and a big congratulations on completing another year of studies! The water caraf and milk jug arrived last week and I finally got around to taking some photos this weekend. As you can see the little one also makes a really cute vase. xo

Big Nails

Look at these enormous nails that were holding parts of the old door frame components together!

Cutting Up the Old Door Frame - Gordon Matta Clark Stye

The builder left all the old door frame pieces in our flat so I spent a good part of the the day sawing it all down into smaller pieces that we could easily dispose of. Look at how the frame was cobbled together with all sorts of different profiles and sections. What a mess! Now dont worry, we werent removing original Georgian building fabric - this was the door that was put in when the building was divided up into flats in the 1970s and what we've put back is much tidier.

Project Main Door

We had a builder come in for a day to build the wall and install the door frame as the work had to be done in a day or we'd be getting to know our neighbours a lot better than we already do now! Flo and I will do all the finishing, sanding and painting this weekend.

Here you can see the first base-coat that I managed to get onto the frame, and the embossed cream coloured wallpaper of our common hallway which is also in need of some love and attention at some point when the other freeholders all agree.

Old Wallpaper Discovered

The exciting progress this week is the installation of a new front door to our flat, along with the surrounding partition. In preparation, we removed part of the partition and discovered this crazy pink and red flock wall paper. Imagine how that must of looked covering the entire hallway!

Shelving Design - Step 2

The next step for the fireplace shelving was for Flo to translate my sketch into a 3-D components drawing so we can send off the pieces to get the MDF cut to size. We're now investigating which will be the better deal www.mdfcuttosize.com or our local timber merchant.

A Virtual Bouquet for Mothers Day

Happy Mothers Day to our German and Canadian mothers!

Here is a virtual bouquet that I picked from our front garden with my camera - Bluebells, Forget-me-nots, Lily of the Valley and another red flower we havent yet identified. The previous ground floor owner who lived in her flat for about 15 years was an avid gardener and now we are enjoying her efforts.

Shelving Design - Step 1

I've been thinking about what kind of shelving to build into the recesses beside the fire place in the living room on my journeys to and from work. Currently there is no storage anywhere in the flat as the Georgians liked free standing wardrobes and furniture, not built-ins.

After many sketches and options, we narrowed it down to our top four and have now settled on Option 3 above. This has two shelves each side for books and a radiator cover with some shallow storage beside it on the lower left.

Our street on a BBC History Series!

This morning when I went to collect the post there was a note from Century films explaining that our street would be featured in their new series 'Our Secret Streets'!!

120 years ago Charles Booth, a social researcher, recorded the social condition of every one of London's 4 million inhabitants. He carried out research by visiting every single street in London, which took him 17 years. His work was published in a 17 volume study called 'The Life and Labour of the People in London'. The BBC is reproducing this study focusing on six streets and their residents.

How cool is that?!!

For more, check out: www.oursecretstreets.com

The photo is a small map from 1910 that I purchased at an antique maps shop on Portabello Road as a moving gift to ourselves when we closed on the property. Our terrace house is on the west side of the street at the 'E' in 'GROVE' of Camberwell Grove.

Another 'special' detail sorted out

Because no one would think to look in this small corner of our living room I am making a special Blog post for it so everyone can see our hard work. There was a huge lump of plaster and polyfilla which we hacked off, then Flo made a new piece of skirting and extended the window surround, and I finished the job off with the paint.