I was varnishing my gran's house woodwork today when i realised a thread on housing would be interesting. For example, have you varnished/ painted your woodwork recently? Do you prefer wood framed over stone built housing? Whats the local type of building down your way? Do you use harling on your walls, or is your climate dry enough not to need it? In the UK, a lot of houses have the bedrooms on the first floor, living area on teh ground, why is this? I am sure i had some good points to make, but I cant remember them.
a few years ago I resurfaced my oak hard wood floors and used a very high priced polyurethane. They told me this is what they use for roller skating rinks floors. I put on 5 coats and it looks great still. Very durable and easy to clean. I won't have to redo my floors for at least 10 years from what I read on the can. It will not discolor or crack , guaranteed. What is harling ?
Ahhh, but theyre inside, arent they? Its the sun that does all the damage to woodwork. Look at boats. They have to revarnish teak and such every few years. harling is a protective coating applied to a wall, to help the rain run off and stop it penetrating very far. Its very common in scotland, has been for maybe 1,000 years. Usually its small stones and some cement, with some sand and perhaps a colourant. In the old days they used lime mortar, which is not waterproof, but allows the wall to breath. BAsically, in scotland we have a lot of sandstone to use as building material, and its often porous, and can erode a bit fast, so the harling acts as both a sacrificial coating and a means of keeping excess water out.
The trend in the USA is away from exposed wood surfaces in house construction and remodeling. Particularly hardwood floors, we regard them as lovely but quite impractical if you don't have servants. We're really bad about wiping our shoes (or swapping them for slippers) when we enter, so we track in a lot of abrasive grit. Add to that our thoroughly undisciplined children and pets running in and out, and a wood floor needs refinishing at least once a year. Millions of old American houses have hardwood floors that have been covered with sheet linoleum, vinyl tile, or wall-to-wall carpeting, depending on the era in which the job was performed. The newer houses have floors of construction-grade wood that are covered before they're first sold. Our house was custom-built by the original owners and it has hardwood. They were in good condition when we moved in and we immediately covered them with Oriental rugs to keep them that way. The "family room," however, was long-ago covered with carpeting. Nonetheless, custom-built houses often have hardwood floors. For the first few years the owners rigidly enforce the "no street shoes" rule. Eventually the violations of the rule by children and pets take their toll. Some of those fairly new floors already have tile or carpeting. In California where we live, any type of masonry must be steel-reinforced to withstand earthquakes, so anything built within the last hundred years is wood-frame. Our old house in the Los Angeles area was built in Spanish style, so it had exposed wrought-iron bars instead of wooden beams to triangulate the ceiling. Even the old missions and hotels are being retro-fitted by drilling holes and inserting rebar. In southern California where the weather is mild, stucco is the most common exterior material. On the North Coast where our home is now, there are actual seasons to deal with so wood-shingle siding is more typical. In Arizona where I lived as a child, concrete blocks were commonly used for quick, cheap construction. With the emphasis on "cheap," they weren't even finished on the inside, so you were looking at a painted block wall that resembled the inside of a Third World prison, complete with bare concrete slab floors. Of course when the bulding boom hit in the 1960s and mass-produced housing tracts sprang up, wooden frames became standard. Ditto for the East Coast where I'm temporarily working. The older houses are made of bricks but the post-war cookie-cutter houses are wood frame with wood shingles. Lately they've taken to covering them with faux-brick and faux-stone siding, as if they're fooling anybody. There are a number of old stone houses that are considered treasures. First time I've ever seen the word. Few parts of America are quite as damp as the UK. Wallpaper lasts for years here, whereas I understand that in England you have to replace it every year or two. Our exterior walls seem to survive without the treatment you speak of. We live on the edge of a forest so we have quite a bit of trouble with mildew and other types of mold. We can't put a bed or anything right up against the wall or it gets moldy. Our hanging art has rubber blocks to keep it from touching the walls and being destroyed. It took me a minute to figure that out, since over here the "first floor" is the ground floor. I think that's a fairly universal floor plan, at least in Western countries. You want your guests to walk in the front door and immediately be in the public areas, rather than catching a glimpse into your bedroom, study, office, and other private rooms along the way. Furthermore, as you get older you need to limit your stair-climbing. Going up once for bed and down once for breakfast is manageable for all but the most severely arthritic knees. Having to go up and down every time you go outside or into the workshop is something many people simply can't do. My wife and I both have really bad knees. (In the 1950s American schoolchildren were forced to perform "deep knee bends" as exercise so there's a whole generation of us who now can't even do the "shallow" variety.) Seven years ago we passed up a lovely two-story house in favor of the rambling one we now own. If we had bought it, today we'd be taking bids on installing an elevator.
I own a cbs home or concrete block structure as it is also known. It has a single story and is raised off the ground 4 feet. It also has a crawl space in order to fix any plumbing or gas piping that is located under the wood joists. Most homes here in Key West are of this material however some of the older homes are made of wood only.Here's a image of Ernest Hemmingways home here in the Keys that was built about 75 years ago. It was wood and still is, they preserve it very well as you can see. http://www.resortislands.com/florida-keys/images/ernest-hemingway-house.jpg http://ts.pjtechie.com/trips/hem1.JPG
I live on the west coast of scotland (river clyde). I stay in a 100 year old flat that has been converted from servant living quarters, high ceilings (11 foot), cornicing, original skirting, its fantastic we have lived hear for 10 years now. Although the floors are all made of wood we have carpets down rather than the bare floorboards. The walls are made of lathing plaster and the roof has slates on it. Most of the houses in my area are made the same way though only the old ones have the period features, and they do not use lathing plaster anymore. We freshen the paint every few years, but as neither of us smoke it is only cosmetic.
Well, I live in western Germany and our house is build with stone, concrete and steel, there was no wood used in the structure, as a result, there isn´t much to be done... And it is the general building style around here.
Fraggle rocker: "The trend in the USA is away from exposed wood surfaces in house construction and remodeling. " I assume that is about ease of maintenance. Here we have a lot of plastic boarding put in in the eaves of the houses, not the wooden ones are rotting after 30 years. "Even the old missions and hotels are being retro-fitted by drilling holes and inserting rebar." Not many problems with that then? I assume its dry enough to avoid many of the problems you would get over here with rust and stuff. Wood shingle siding? How long does that last? Then it needs repainted I assume. "In Arizona where I lived as a child, concrete blocks were commonly used for quick, cheap construction. With the emphasis on "cheap," they weren't even finished on the inside, so you were looking at a painted block wall that resembled the inside of a Third World prison, complete with bare concrete slab floors." I am in Scotland, which had more than its fair share of insane 60's concrete constructions, including such exciting places as tower blocks with concrete cladding that started falling off when the holding bolts rusted a few years down the line. Let alone that some of it rotted and crumbled in various interesting ways. "Wallpaper lasts for years here, whereas I understand that in England you have to replace it every year or two. Our exterior walls seem to survive without the treatment you speak of. We live on the edge of a forest so we have quite a bit of trouble with mildew and other types of mold. We can't put a bed or anything right up against the wall or it gets moldy. Our hanging art has rubber blocks to keep it from touching the walls and being destroyed." HHmm. I have seen perfectly good condition 70 or 80 year old wallpaper, but, it was inside an uninhabited building with a sound roof. if water was running down the walls it would last only a couple of years. In a proper waterproof house wallpaper lasts for decades. the tricky thing with mould is that here you have to keep the outer wall watertight. I've seen a wee victorian manor house that was a death trap a few years ago, because the exterior walling and water coursing and whatever else wasnt done properly, so dry rot got in. It grows perfectly in the spaces under the floors, and in that kind of building, the plaster on the walls is held on a wooden frame keyed into bits of wood in the stone walls, so when all that rots the walls are reduced to their bare rubble. Whats your wall actually made of? I mean letting the damp in like that isnt healthy surely? Cosmictraveler: "I own a cbs home or concrete block structure as it is also known. It has a single story and is raised off the ground 4 feet. It also has a crawl space in order to fix any plumbing or gas piping that is located under the wood joists. Most homes here in Key West are of this material however some of the older homes are made of wood only.Here's a image of Ernest Hemmingways home here in the Keys that was built about 75 years ago. It was wood and still is, they preserve it very well as you can see." Raising them above the ground sounds like a good idea. But if your in key west, thats Florida, right? So why, in a place that gets hit by Hurricanes, do they haev so many trailer parks and houses that get splatted by hurricanes? If Ernest Hemingways house has survived that long, is it in a dry part or do they repaint it every few years? Here, if you slap thick coats of paint that resembles plastic on outbuildings, they'll last for years, just not look very good. Mickeyboy: "I live on the west coast of scotland (river clyde). I stay in a 100 year old flat that has been converted from servant living quarters, high ceilings (11 foot), cornicing, original skirting, its fantastic we have lived hear for 10 years now. Although the floors are all made of wood we have carpets down rather than the bare floorboards. The walls are made of lathing plaster and the roof has slates on it. Most of the houses in my area are made the same way though only the old ones have the period features, and they do not use lathing plaster anymore. We freshen the paint every few years, but as neither of us smoke it is only cosmetic. " I'm jealous. Is it the good old kind of plaster with horsehair in it?
Guthrie you ask: "Raising them above the ground sounds like a good idea. But if your in key west, thats Florida, right? So why, in a place that gets hit by Hurricanes, do they haev so many trailer parks and houses that get splatted by hurricanes? If Ernest Hemingways house has survived that long, is it in a dry part or do they repaint it every few years? Here, if you slap thick coats of paint that resembles plastic on outbuildings, they'll last for years, just not look very good." Key West is only about 5 miles square. The highest point is 5 feet above sea level The house was raised for flooding and for ventilation. There are vents every 10 feet to allow air to pass through under the house therefore letting the home breathe better to get cooler floors and good circulation of air. Ernest H. house is very well maintained and because many visitors come here to see it, it gets a very good refinishing everytime it is needed using only the best of materials and labor. Here in Key West there's no trailer parks, only houses. The thing to remember is that any house that is hit with winds over 150 MPH will not fair well no matter how well it was made in the past. Today they have more stringent codes and better constrution ways than they did 50 years ago. Not much room here for any new homes, all the land is already been built upon.
Yeah mate, it's 1.5 inches thick in some places, solid as a rock. been up for 100 plus years and it aint going anywhere in a hurry. The thing i like about it the most though is the size of the rooms, ours is only a two bedroom flat but the rooms are huge, our kitchen for instance has a fully fitted kitchen as well as a table that you can get 12 round and that is not even in the part where the units are.
Ease of maintenance is indeed a key consideration as the American work week inexplicably continues to stretch beyond the 48 hours that comprised it at the turn of the last century and every able-bodied adult in the family works to pay the mortgage on our insane home prices. Plastic has started to catch on, especially for safety in roofing. Faux tile roofs made of lightweight plastic sheets don't require the massive infrastructure to support the weight of real ceramic, and they never crash down on your napping Corgi. Wooden shake shingles are arguably the real cause of the runaway fires in California, I always refer to them as "roofs made of kindling." The legislature could never manage to outlaw them, but new fireproof faux shake is available and will shortly be mandatory for all new and replacement construction. Our roof is of the cheaper and more drab old-fashioned asphalt (I guess?) shingles. Higher maintenance but when you live on the edge of a forest you really want to be a paragon of fire safety. Even though redwoods secrete acid that makes the soil hostile to underbrush and it's never been provende that a redwood forest could even support a fire, we don't want to be the ones to test that hypothesis. That's strictly a southern California thing, where the annual rainfall of 21 inches almost qualifies as desert. But no, actually the retrofits are not going well. Drilling deep into a 300-year-old building is a very controversial measure. The whole thing could just come down. Of course that just proves the need for earthquake reinforcement so it doesn't come down on a busload of tourists. I fear some of our most famous missions will suffer the fate of the Gaudi cathedral in Barcelona, closed to the public and festooned with scaffolding for decades while the engineers try to come up with something better. Even up in the northwestern part of California, where we have water to spare, the rainfall is still only about fifty inches so it's not difficult to protect against. Sturdier paint continues to be invented, I believe a new paint job might last ten years. The shingles themselves, fifty years old already, will probably last until our heirs decide to tear the house down and build a sprawl of condominiums. Or just tear it down and let the entire lot revert to forest, since we're the last generation of both families and intend to will the property to a nature group. Occasionally an individual shingle needs replacing, it's rather like maintaining a shingle roof. America's homebuilding industry has gone back and forth with the concept of air- and watertightness. At one point we had the "sick building" syndrome where toxins generated by the inhabitants accumulated. At its worst, houses were trapping radon that effervesces out of every point on the earth's surface and causing horrid illnesses. One man turned his basement into a breeding aviary for Hyacinthine macaws (the poster child of the endangered species movement) and populated it with a quarter million dollars worth of the birds -- his family's entire fortune. They began dying and no veterinarian could find the cause. He eventually committed suicide out of despair (doubtless cheating his family out of any life insurance he might have had, what a nice guy). His widow vowed to find the answer and discovered it was radon. The "canary in the coal mine" scenario writ far too large. You probably have trouble understanding that in California nobody has much fear of the weather. We have no screens on our windows and none of the doors and windows are sealed very thoroughly. Even in the north the temperature rarely drops to freezing so heat loss is something we generally ignore, and the summers are so mild we just throw the windows open; no one has air conditioning. Our attitude is that air circulation is the key to keeping everything and everyone healthy. We have dehumidifiers in our storerooms and sometimes we run one in the bedroom after two humans and ten indoor dogs have spent the night fogging up the windows. The walls are framed with fir 2x4's, wood shingles on the outside and sheetrock on the inside, with very light-duty fiberglass insulation in between. Our former home in Los Angeles County, which we still own and rent out, was built in the 1920s, stucco over wire on the outside and lath and plaster on the inside.
Thanks everyone. I might learn as much by going and reading a book on buildings around the world, but then again, probably not, and this way is much more fun. Mickeyboy- I am wondering, maybe your flat is 2 old ones knocked together. I think some places theyve knocked 2 single ends into one flat, for more modern inhabitants. Or else it is just one of the good tenement blocks like we have here in edinburgh, high ceilings, large rooms, and only 4 stories high. Fraggle Rocker: The different climate concerns are interesting. Here its just too wet and windy. I can also imagine a roof of plastic shingles peeling away in the wind.... I believe that here houses have to be built with ventilation under the floor etc, but theres a lot of people who live with the windows shut all the time, and wonder why their children end up allergic to dust mites etc. Radon is a problem up Aberdeen way, they've lots of granite, bu you can seal the floors etc against it, and as far as I know its not a huge problem. I knew CA was well known for its clement climate, but its still funny to see how good it is.
