December 3, 2004
A Finished Porch
The guys are finished rebuilding the porch!
This is what the porch used to be:
That picture doesn’t even really capture the decrepitness of the porch. It was easily the most worn-out part of our house… In just over a month, the porch was torn off and rebuilt like new (but better!). We had the stairs to the second floor removed for space and security reasons, and we had the upstairs screened so that the cats could go out. Josh, the lead on the project, suggested building in roof access from the second floor and this became one of my favorite things about the new porch.
This is the porch now:
The contrast between the nice and new porch with those grubby shingles is something, eh?
This is the roof access from the porch. There is plexiglass there, and and a cool hatch.
Details…
Looks great, John!
Wow - what a great new porch! You’ve certainly kept us in suspense since your last updates, but I’m glad to see the beautiful finished product. I especially like the porch railing detail. It’s very rare to find craftsman who give such attention to detail nowadays, so that really stands out. So…what project is next?
Leah
The pieces of the porch that we call “cut-outs” (not knowing if there is a proper ‘house’ word for them…) were mostly from the original porch, upstairs and down. The guys had to cut a few to make up enough just do the downstairs. Most of the columns were saved (and refurbished) from the original porch. Not too much else was able to be re-used… The attention paid to detail by these guys is amazing! I haven’t been able to really take a picture that captures the solid beauty of their work.
As for next, we REALLY need to finish getting the insulation and walls up downstairs. To get to this, we need to finish fixing the termite damaged front-corner of the house. oh — and jack and brace a sagging part of the floor. It all ties together and probably won’t get good and going until after the holidays…
Looks great! I love that cutout to the roof … such a lovely patch of sky to look at. I won’t be telling my cats about your cats’ screened porch - they would be far too jealous.
I’m catching up on my reading and…whoa! Nice porch! It’s really cool.
The porch looks extra nice. It will be suh-weet in the spring.
very nice porch. and I must agree that having roof access from the porch makes life much easier for spot repairs, leaf cleaning etc. etc. Plus it is nice to get on the roof, make your voice real deep and talk to passersby like you’re God talking from heaven. Yo! this is God. Have you called your mom recently?
I want to have plexiglass on my enclosed porch, but the contractor says that it will not last a year, it will get hazy and cannot be cleaned with Windex. Have you heard of anything regarding this?
What is your experience been like with the plexiglass that you installed?
Doris - From what we’ve seen, your contractor os telling you a truth. The plexi has warped a little and is not clear. This is fine for the roof hatch, but would be terrible for anything that is supposed to mimic glass.