Part 4: Before and After Pictures

The Farmhouse renovation has been quite a process!  It has transformed the house into the kind of a comfortable place where you can settle right down-  whether to find a nook for reading, to take in the view from the back deck, to watch a movie in the rec room, to chat with friends on the front porch, or to catch a few winks in one of the comfortable beds. 

Here are some pictures of parts of the house before and after the renovation project-

Before

After

Here are views of the living room with restored fireplace and original walls and floor.  The floor is finished in black walnut juice (made by soaking black walnut hulls in water) and tung oil- apparently this used to be  a common floor finish in our area of Virginia.  It works great- we refinished the floors this way when we bought the house in 2009 and haven’t felt the need to refresh the finish until now. No sanding was required-  just another coat of walnut juice and tung oil.

The downstairs bedroom had been the master bedroom.  The ceiling was so low and saggy that anyone taller than 6 feet would have to stoop in the middle of the room.  We raised the ceiling considerably and re-used some of the wood reclaimed from the house for the floor, wainscot and for ceiling beams. 

We reorganized the bathroom and laundry room downstairs for more space in the bathroom and better workflow in the laundry room.  We also added a deep sink- very useful!

The kitchen layout was improved for better workflow and to accommodate a dishwasher. The cabinets were painted white, and a closed pantry was removed and replaced with open shelving.  We kept the marmoleum floor which had been installed in 2009-  it was incredibly tough, standing up to months of construction traffic- and it still looks great.

The upstairs floor plan was changed significantly, enlarging the original front bedroom, eliminating a short hallway, creating a landing at the top of the stairs along with a new bedroom and bathroom.

Here is the before and after view of the bedroom in the old section of the house. 

A back bedroom became our rec room

And we added a new bedroom and bath

Another new addition was the upper back deck-  it has become one of our favorite spaces in the house. There is a great view of the vegetable garden from there as well as a long view of neighboring fields and the Southwest Mountains in the distance.

And let’s not forget the front porch- now big enough for a comfortable conversation.  It’s on the shady side of the house, so it is a great place to sit on a summer afternoon. 

The Farmhouse is  available year-round for farmstay vacations…. 

Why not give it a try? You’ll find details on our website. 

Part 3: Reconstruction of the Farmhouse

We can’t leave the Farmhouse in such a state for too long!  All of that deconstruction made way for some major upgrades when the Farmhouse was put back together again-  central heat and AC, excellent insulation, modern plumbing that we won’t have to fix once a month, new standing seam metal roof, new windows that really work! 

Updated appliances, restored chimney,  solid construction throughout,  new bedroom and bathroom upstairs,  modern slope to the stairs-  much safer than the old, steep stairs!

Larger front porch with room to sit and talk, new upper level deck in back,- all these improvements to an old house that still feels old.  I really started to enjoy checking on the progress of the project-  each day brought delightful new details, and the Farmhouse really started to take shape.

Here’s a look inside when the house was partially finished.. the Living Room

Kitchen

Downstairs Bedroom

Upstairs Bedroom in the Original Section of the House

Upstairs Bedroom in the New Wing

The Rec Room

Next Up: Some Before and After Pictures- and the completion of our renovation project.

Part 2 The Deconstruction of the Farmhouse

So here is our list of requirements for our farmhouse renovation:

Keep the character of the original 1830s house

Reuse as much of the original wood as possible

Install central heat and air

Install modern windows

Insulate the walls, crawlspace and attic

Lengthen the ridge to enlarge the second floor footprint

This added an extra bedroom and bathroom

Reduce the steepness of the stairway

Add an upper deck at the back of the house

What we envisioned was an old farmhouse with many of the energy saving features and conveniences of a 21^st century house.

This seemed straightforward enough, but I didn’t realize the extent to which the house would need to be deconstructed in order to accomplish our goals.  As time went by, it became somewhat alarming-

First, the siding came off…

Revealing some problems that had been hidden for quite some time…

Then one particularly poorly constructed addition came off; this had been the master bedroom and shed storage area above.

I think this was the low point for me-  the house looked so dejected and sad.  I honestly wondered how it could ever be made habitable again!  I cringed every time I took a good look at it! Of course, all this time, Chris and the crew were carefully salvaging almost all of the wood from the old construction and beginning to plane it down in preparation for re-using it.

Then the reconstruction finally got underway and things started looking more hopeful again. The crew dug under the crawlspace of the house, and laboriously removed large amounts of dirt, enlarging it allow a person to actually get under the house if necessary.  The old, shaky foundation was replaced with a proper new one and additional supports for the first floor were added. 

To be continued...

Our Farmhouse Renovation- Part 1

An Opportunity and a Project

We bought a six acre property, two miles from our home farm in 2009 and started growing vegetables there in 2010. The land slopes gently to the southeast and the soil is good for vegetable growing. There was also an old house on the property that  had some charming features, and also some that needed repair or updating.  

We cleaned it up and painted after buying the property, but decided not to do any renovation work. 

 

Our friends, Keriann and Jeroen rented the house for 5 years and made it into a cozy home.  

Then in 2015 when Keriann and Jeroen moved their Ecotulips business to Rhode Island, we decided the time had come for a ‘minor’ renovation.   We interviewed several contractors and hired Chris Gilley of Castlewood Construction to be our general contractor.  

Our initial program was pretty simple:

1. Raise the ceiling of the master bedroom downstairs; it was sagging and anyone over 6 feet would have to stoop to walk in the middle of the room 

2. Do some minor renovations in the kitchen.  

Once Chris began investigating, he quickly found out why the ceiling was sagging-  there was very little holding it up!  The joists holding up the floor in the storage area above were just propped on the ends of the siding boards; no beams for support! 

  

Our minor renovation project soon became a major one.  We decided to see obstacles as opportunities and developed our requirements for the project:

Keep the character of the original 1830s house

Reuse as much of the original wood as possible

Install central heat and air

Install modern windows

Insulate the walls, crawlspace and attic

Lengthen the ridge to enlarge the second floor footprint

This added an extra Rec room and bathroom

Reduce the steepness of the stairway

Add an upper deck at the back of the house

What we envisioned was an old farmhouse with many of the energy saving features and conveniences of a 21^st century house.  These posts will trace the progress of our renovation; stay tuned for Part 2!