Layers

So while I was gone in NH this past weekend, Jeff decided to start on what we're HOPING will be one of the less involved projects on the house- the dining room.

The plan for this room is:
* Remove drop ceiling and go back to 10 foot ceiling
* Remove wallpaper
* Remove paneling
* Remove carpet
* Refinish hardwood floor
* Patch plaster walls
* Decide on drywall or plaster ceiling, and finish
* Install beadboard wainscoting around the room (oak preferably, to match trim).
* Install new light fixture to provide more light and accentuate high ceiling
* Choose new drapery hardware and sew new valences or panels.

border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5231659714084871522" /> Before- lots of wallpaper and paneling


Before- the other side of the room


The drop ceilings taken down


Removing one of the layers of paneling (4x8 foot pieces)


Lots of construction adhesive left on the walls.

Well, Jeff started with the drop ceilings and took them all down while I was gone. Underneath was an additional 2 feet of headspace which had been covered up. The celing had peeling paint on it, as well as an area that shows a water stain. We're anticipating that this was from an ice backup on the porch roof, sometime before it was replaced 8 years ago. The ceiling is plaster, with a 1/8" wallboard on top of it. We still need to decide whether we're going back to plaster for the ceiling, or if we're going to have it drywalled.

We spent tonight working on the walls. Talk about LAYERS! There is light wood colored paneling, on top of wall paper, on top of dark wood paneling, which is then CONSTRUCTION ADHESIVED to the 1/8 " wallboard, which is somehow adhered to the plaster. We had to remove window trim and pull up the carpet around the corners of the room to get this stuff off the walls. As you can see from the pictures, the construction adhesive remains.

One cool thing, is that for whatever reason, the baseboard trim was not nailed directly to the wall. Instead, there are strips of newspaper which were placed between the baseboard and the wall. It's funny reading excerpts from the Grand Rapids Press from May of 1981. I'm going to save some of the clippings for my house restoration scrapbook :-).

I found a product which we can get at a dealer in Kzoo, which will allow us to paint it on the wallboard, and then apply plaster directly to that (rather than the normal 3 step plaster process, which you have to let dry for literally at YEAR!). So we're thinking we're going to replicate the look of the restored living room, and do plaster in there. Another fun skill to learn :-).

So far, the cost of the room has been:
$16- Ceiling primer
$2- dust masks
$65- new light fixture (originally $169- we got it on clearance at Lowes :-)