1930s Duncan Phyfe Style Dining Set

We just purchased this great 1930s solid wood Duncan Phyfe style dining room set for $275. The antique sideboard has a beautiful serpentine veneer and antique brass pulls. We intend to restore this set to a beautiful cherry finish, and mend and reupholster the chairs, saving a lot of money, while gaining a lovely dining room.











It is now 2011 and over the course of many decades, pieces of Cleveland history and American history have been lost for many reasons. The biggest reason is part of American culture: the desire to buy "new" and throw the "old" away.

Restoring beauty to our once, neglected, and abused 1920s colonial, in a hard-hit first-time home buyer community in the rust belt city, is the ultimate recycling project, but our efforts won't stop there. A wonderful way to help give back to the community is to purchase local used furniture when possible. Craigslist, local antique stores, consignment shops, thrift outlets, and the Freecycle are excellent ways of finding beautiful, affordable pieces that need your rescue. Many times these great finds will ultimately wind up in a landfill.

If you are interested in purchasing an old piece of furniture and you are not sure how to go about restoring it. Please e-mail me: sola.live@gmail.com and I would be glad to give you some tips.

Dining Room Restoration Complete!

The long awaited photos of the completed work and the before images. The project began in the beginning of June 2010. The plaster walls were in rough shape as pictured and all of the woodwork was slopped with mismatched white paint.

Early, June over the course of three days, the walls were skim coated for a professionally smooth new finish. The back entry casement was stripped because it had layers of paint over top of painter's tape. Then, the old deco wallpaper was removed from the interior of the built-ins. The paint was stripped from the built-ins and windows. Everything was carefully sanded, stained, and restored. The walls were then treated with high build primer. The ceiling cracks were repaired with fiberglass tape and and plaster which was sanded smooth. Finally, the popcorn soffit was repaired, and re-textured with a swirl technique for an updated look.

The beautiful leaded glass doors were salvaged from Attenson's on Coventry and expertly installed by our carpenter, Barry Hoffman at Hoffman Construction He did a wonderful job custom fitting the doors, and retrofitting new antique style hardware.

The walls are painted Wild Honey, and the trim Powdered Snow by Behr.

The custom looking art deco chandelier was an eBay purchase featuring opal art glass, solid brass coated in antique silver finish, with antique copper wire detail. retailed for $569 by Forecast Lighting

NEW Old Doors

We just had another matching door installed on a pantry closet in the rear sun-room addition area of our house. The previous door that existed was removed early in the renovation of our house because it was just too caked with paint. It was also really heavy and cumbersome for the closet.

Anyway, this is an old door that is from the same house as the other one that went in our kitchen/entry area. It wasn't in as good condition as the other one, but with some Murphy's oil soap, and some stain touch-up it looks great now.






Here's a view of the other door as seen from the kitchen. I love how it looks with the color we chose for the kitchen. This door has a nice glossy finish on it, which is very pretty with the grain.




excuse all the clutter on our fridge! :)

Doors Are In!

Well, after an unfortunate mishap involving one of our beloved furry friends escaping, and going astray for 1 night, we are glad to have some new doors in our entryway...we weren't glad to have the doors at the expense of losing Tucker a.k.a. little Tyke, but thank heavens...he has returned home safely and we can appreciate that the work was completed by our contractor Barry.





Wow, whose house is this, again? Barry was able to pick up that antique door on the cheap for us, and it was just about a perfect fit. Looks like it's been there forever.

We now have a spacious storage closet, we can keep the kitty food in as well. 3 more doors to go on the 1st floor which is coming along nicely.

Kitchen Painted

Color is Cape Hatteras Sand by Benjamin Moore

Photos taken after the first coat. I still have a lot of touch-up work to do.


Well, my goal was to have the kitchen painted by the time we went to the Hessler Street fair this Saturday...and I met that goal! I began the following Monday after Mother's Day working to prepare the kitchen to be painted. That work included:

1. repairing damage from the electrican's work.
2. Spackling low areas in the wall & removing high areas lightly sanding
3. Sanding up the doorway trims to remove paint drips & slops, scraping peeling paint, applying peel stop, then wood putty in areas to be sanded.

Liam caulked the trims & baseboards.

Then, everything was sanded & then primed.

4. I stippled the ceiling. Liam helped paint the ceiling.

NEW RUG...

I'm very happy with this rug I won on eBay for $39 with free shipping. If you're from Cleveland, you would call this a "Marc's bargain!"...

No bungee cords, flashing hazards, 20 mph, flippin' birds, or honking necessary. It arrived quickly!

There are a lot of great rug deals to be had on there...antique and new-one of the advantages of this economy.

Finished Entryway!

The painting in our side entryway/mini foyer is just about finished. Here are some photos of the completed work. Liam is about to install the closet door. I have possibly 1 more coat to do on the red entry door.





















clickHEREfor BEFORE images.