This is what you see as you enter through the front door.
2010
I stood on the front porch to take this photo. The foyer is wide and roomy, and is a great space to greet friends and guests. There are parts of the foyer that are completely finished (mainly the walls), but most of it is a work in progress. As I show you around, you will see lots of stripped wood and trim that is waiting to be sanded and painted. Eventually, these projects will rise to the top of the list. Until then, they're fine just the way they are.
2002
This is what it looked like the first time I walked into this house, when we were touring it with our realtor in the summer of 2002. The stair runner at the time was too narrow and worn out, and I have always called that light fixture the "Bug Bucket".
2010
2010
And the living room is on the right. When we bought this house in 2002, the door to the living room was missing. We found it in a pile of junk, as we were cleaning stuff out of the loft of our barn. Who knows how long it had been there. I used a heat gun and a scraper to strip off many layers of peeling paint, revealing the original colors of cream and green (See the green on the corner blocks and the door panels?) We keep this door closed because the living room is nowhere close to finished, and we use it for storage right now ... such is life when living in an old house under renovation.
2010
The front door is huge and heavy ... 42 inches wide!! There is never any problem getting furniture into or out of the house through this door. It took me over a week of solid work with my heat gun and various scraping tools to remove all of the built-up paint from the door, sidelights, and transom.
2002
Here's a before shot of the front door, showing the white paint (it will be white again one day), and the gold flocked Japanese-style, 1960's wallpaper.
2010
This mirror was a gift from the family we bought the house from. They left it for us (in the dining room) because the wife thought it should stay. I love it, and I moved it to what I think is the perfect spot behind the front door.
2002
This is the staircase in 2002. Notice the curvy trim on the side of each step, and the ogee molding that surrounds each wood panel.
2010
Right now, all of the trim is in the basement. It's stripped and sanded, and it's ready to be primed and reinstalled ... whenever I get around to it. I removed half of the balusters because it is easier to strip them if they're not in place, and to make it easier for the floor refinishers when they did their job on the stair treads. The stair railing and newel post wear their original finish, which I protect with the dedication of a mother bear. I have threatened more than one tradesperson working here ... warning them of the possibility of immediate, violent death if anyone were to damage the finish.
2010
From this angle, you can see the wool runner we had installed after the steps were refinished, the chandelier I restored and installed, the mahogany clock that we bought as a present to each other on our 25th anniversary, and an aerial photo of the house.
2010
I found this chandelier online, at a shop at Ruby Lane Antiques, and it is PERFECT for this space. My father-in-law disassembled it, I painted and antiqued the pieces, and he rewired and reassembled it. From the look on Alice's face, I think she approves.
2010
The clock was built for us by Irvin Rosen, of McKinley, Virginia. Mr. Rosen was in his late 80's when he built our clock (and another one identical to it for someone else). He is an exceptional cabinet maker, with a workshop full of wonders. We have two more Rosen clocks (a banjo click and a pillar and scroll clock). I feel priviledged to have met him, and honored to have such beautiful examples of his work in our home.
2010
The aerial photo of the house was taken some time after the addition was built in 1967. It appears to be a hand-colored black and white print, and it has never left the house. Each owner passes it to the next ... a tradition I will keep, if I were to sell the house ... which I'm not going to do.
2002
The door to the basement is under the stairs, facing the aerial photo. It hasn't changed much since I took this photo in 2002.
2010
This oak sideboard is the very first piece of antique furniture that my husband and I bought after we married. We are now using it as a place to drop keys and whatnot, and we store our shoes in the bottom section ... to keep Daniel from eating them. On it, you see two oak humidors that once belonged to my husband's grandmother, and a miniature Lane cedar box from a furniture store in Fredericksburg. These tiny boxes were given by furniture stores to graduating senior girls, in hopes that the girls would visit the store to buy their 'hope chests'. I collect these boxes, which are stamped with the company name and address, from local companies whenever I find them. So far, I have Fredericksburg, Richmond, Charlottesville, and Orange. (all Virginia, of course)
2010
As we go upstairs, this is what the view to the downstairs looks like from the first landing. If you look carefully, you can see Alice lounging on the rug by the front door.
2010
This small flight of stairs leads to the upstairs landing and two of our four bedrooms ... the doors are closed to protect the innocent.
2002
In 2002, before we moved in, this landing had the same gold flocked wallpaper as the foyer. After removing the wallpaper, stripping the paint off the doors, walls, and trim, repairing the plaster and painting the walls .... it now looks like this.
2010
The French doors lead to the roof of the front porch. They were installed in place of a window during the 1960's renovation.
2010
Here's a photo showing all of the stairs, and Dorothy coming out of the Family Room. Alice is still on the rug.
2010
Back downstairs (there's Dorothy again). This doorway leads to the dining room and kitchen (which I'll show you some other time.). It was cut into what was originally the back wall of the house. One side of that line in the floor is original 1848, and the other side is 1967.
As you have seen, there is still a lot of work to be done in the foyer. The doors and moldings are stripped of all their globby, built-up paint, and I have to give them a final sanding and who-knows-how-many coats of paint. The stairs will have their trim and balusters primed and reinstalled. Don't even get me started thinking about the work that's going to be necessary on the front door.
Even with all of this ahead of me, I look around and I fall in love with our house all over again. Can you imagine how many people have walked through our front door in the 160+ years of history in this place. Each family has made changes, some good and some awful. I'm trying to sort out these changes ... keeping the good ones and repairing the mistakes ... on our home's road to restoration.
