Before:
When I moved in, most of the house was in good, vintage condition and just needed a little patching, paint and minor freshening up. But this room was a different story. It's the larger of the two bedrooms, and it had been "updated" at some point in its history. It had dingy, dark carpet, some very unfortunate faux-wood paneling, and a completely intolerable drop ceiling. It's an old house, and I knew there would be trouble lurking under all that grim decor. So when my friend and I removed everything, we weren't at all surprised to find large cracks in the plaster, damage from a former roof leak, and split floorboards. Sadly, all the good "before" pictures were lost when my computer crashed a couple of years ago, so this is all the proof I have:
It was pretty bad, and even though I really like doing physical home-improvement work, this job was way out of my league. Experts had to be called in. I was a nervous wreck the first week, but then I began to trust.
During:
Day 1: Demolition.
Whoa. They tore it up! When I got home at the end of the day, I knew that I would never have been able to do this myself. At least not without causing myself a great deal of distress. I was so happy, because they uncovered almost two feet of additional space in the ceiling.
When I went over to the windowsill, I could tell that this nail had been being such a jerk all day long. Just look at him. What a menace! He needs to be defenestrated.
Day 2: Removal.
After the demolition, a mystic portal opened and delivered an additional crew of guys who hauled all the debris away. I almost wish I could've left it this way, but there were several reasons why that wasn't possible.
Day 3 - 4: Rebuilding.
The core crew came back and framed in the walls and ceiling, attached nailers to the brick, installed insulation, and ran all new electrics.
Day 5 - 8: Surfaces.
Sheetrock was installed on all the walls and the ceiling, then mudded and primed. Also, 3/4" plywood was installed to create a totally solid, squeak-free floor. There is nothing worse than a squeaky floor when you're trying to record vocals.
Day 8 - 10: Finishing.
Trims, outlets and light switches were installed, and the floor was filled and sanded.
And then... I painted!
Since my house is small, this room might need to serve a few other purposes besides just recording, but I won't know until I have everything organized. I have to admit, though: part of me wants to leave it completely empty. Sigh...
But that's crazytalk! So I've told that part of myself to shut the hell up and start moving things in!
