the master bedroom and bathroom

 

The master bedroom was added in the 1970's, over the 1930's family room addition:

The bathroom, however, was tucked in to the second floor of the 1860's addition:

Well, if nothing else, it certainly makes for an interesting mix of materials uncovered during demolition. But, when we saw it for the first time, it was one hundred percent, completely uniform "Boogie Nights" material:

      

Well, maybe "Boogie Nights" meets Boo Radley... this room was gruesome. We weren't even sure where to begin.

Where did we actually begin? Contrary to popular wisdom, at the bottom. Yes, the lime green shag carpeting had to go, and not just because someone's cat had been using it for a litter box for years. Here's a scan of it, color unaltered. We're only disappointed we couldn't capture the true "lime-ness" of it for the scanner:

From there, down came the smoked, gold-veined marbelized wall o'mirrored tile, and finally, the metallic peacock wallpaper... but not before we scanned a sample to preserve for posterity:

After stripping away just about every finish surface in the room, we were left with this:

     

Nasty as it was, we think it was an improvement, marginal though it may have been. After taking one look at the subfloor:

... we decided it was time to go one more layer down, and replaced that as well. Hey, we've got our ideas on what that dark stain was, but we don't know for sure. You're welcome to email us your best guess... if you even want to go there.

Anyway, whatever it was, we took it out and replaced it with clean sound subflooring, and decided to rebuild from there.

 

 

Hold on to your hats (or whatever else makes you happy), because you won't believe what this room looks like now. We promise this transformation only involved sweat, grime and a crowbar-- no high explosives necessary. This is what the master bedroom looks like now:

Quite a difference, huh? Roll your mouse arrow over any of the photos below for before and after views, and click on any photo for a larger view:

 

and finally, the famed mirrored wall no more...

 

This is a fun room to do progressive photos on, so indulge us while we have fun with our web design program!

    

 

    

 

Though the master bedroom was one of the first rooms we tackled when we moved in, the master bathroom had to wait while we turned our attention to more immediately decrepit parts of the house. Here it is in all its original splendor:

     

Yes, folks, sad but true... the master bathroom decor coordinated with the original master bedroom decor.

It took us a while to get started on the bathroom, and even longer to actually finish it. We demolished the old bathroom in March 2004:

But we didn't really get started rebuilding it until late Fall. We moved a window, repaired the subfloor, and began plumbing in November 2004. December 2004 found us framing, finishing the plumbing roughout, and running the electric:

We started installing finish materials in January 2005 -- drywall and tile:

   

   

 

And then finally finished the room in February 2005. Roll your mouse over the two photos below for before and after views, or click on either photo for a larger view:

   

 

Click on either photo below for a larger view:

   

 

After we took the photos above, we installed the window treatment on the window in the tub surround. Since it's one of the coolest parts of the bathroom, we figured we'd post a couple photos of it:

   

For the blow-by-blow account of finishing the bathroom, and details on the fixtures and finish materials we used, check out our Journal entry from February 2005.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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