Demo: Week One

I really love demo. I love big open spaces. Makes me want to live in a big white box with beautiful windows and nothing in my house. But even demo costs money. You have to pay for it coming in and going out. 

The first area to get the crowbar was the old porch or what we called the sunroom. Which was exactly that, an old porch that had been glassed in. To build up we have to rebuild the foundation in this area so that it is structural. It will look basically exactly the same when we are done but the ceiling will not be sloped. It will be a flat 8' like the rest of the first floor. For a day or so we were back to 1947 - you could see the painted roof overhang and the original porch covering. The white wall in the photos was the original back of the house. You can see that the door and windows were removed when they glassed in the porch, but the wall remained. 

At this point it felt a little like a Greek villa with all the white sun-drenched walls and open air. I liked it. We even had a nice shady spot to pee. It was short-lived. The next day they started destroying the porch but in exchange they gave us this nice skylight! Seriously, the ceiling and roof is so crazy it is just humorous. The roof is flat, like flat flat. No hidden drainage. Just some tar paper basically over some boards. Right under the boards the previous owner had pieced together bits of pink foam. And then for good measure, since there was no other insulation, he just did another layer of pink foam instead of proper drywall.

By the end of the week they had the porch in pieces just waiting on the dumpster to be switched out so they could fill up a new one. And they started on some interior demo.

our BRYKER remodel

Here we go again. We are in week two of demo at our Bryker Woods house. Here is a quick rundown of our history with the property:

September 2009: Purchase the house, rip out all the carpet, pull up the vinyl flooring, prime the walls white, and move in.

September 2010: House floods from poor drainage combined with on-going and unfixable roof leaks.

January 2012: Fix drainage and upgrade landscaping.

August 2013: Move to Tokyo and rent house to friends for the year.

February 2014: Decide to remodel and start working with an Austin architect while still in Tokyo.

July 2014: Move back in and selectively unpack as we prepare to start remodeling.

January 2015: Finally finalize drawings and submit to city for permits.

April 2015: Move out and into an apartment as work seems imminent.

July 2015: After what seemed like every delay possible, we receive our permits from the city and start work!

And not to ruin the surprise but here is what the front should look like when we are done!

at FULL potential

Here are the images of the Duval house that were taken for the listing. We had a staging company come in and sparsely furnish some of the spaces. The decor was not my favorite but I guess it helps define the spaces a bit. The first time I saw these pictures we were in Japan and I hadn't stepped foot in the house for months. I hadn't even seen the walls with drywall. For a while, all I could see were the things I would have done differently. But now that it is somebody else's home I'm just glad to have saved a special, old house.

long time, no...

Well, obviously I didn't keep up with the blog on the Duval project. We ended up moving to Tokyo and it wouldn't have been possible. We hired a general contractor to oversee the project and just sold the house on January 5th. The whole thing took way longer than we anticipated. As these projects always do.

We are about to start construction on our own house here in Bryker Woods, an old Central Austin neighborhood. We have been working with an architect for about a year to get the plans ready and we are finally just waiting on the city to review and issue us permits. So feel free to follow along as I try and keep up...