Tuesday 27 April 2010

Tub for the master bathroom

It finally arrived yesterday, nearly a month after I pulled the trigger on buying it. I'm thinking of painting the exterior white but leaving the interior in all its zinc-y patina-ed goodness.

Thursday 15 April 2010

We won the appeal! Plus, new art

On Tuesday we won our appeal to the Zoning Board to enlarge the RBB's roof structure and to use the basement as part of the tenants' living space! This is what we've been working for since we bought the building ten months ago. A huge victory! We still have to wait 2 weeks for the Board's decision to be written up and then 3 more for any objections to be filed in court, but for all intents and purposes, we can move forward with construction.

Since there are no pretty pictures from that happy event, I'll share two scores from an art auction I attended yesterday. The photos don't do them justice - the background on the portrait is actually a vibrant turquoise and the landscape is more luminous - plus, it's quite large (23" by 30") plus frame, so it packs a real punch.





The portrait is going to be hung gallery-style with the two portraits I bought in the fall. I'm not sure, but I think I'll hang the landscape in our unit's entry hall.

Monday 5 April 2010

New front doors

On Saturday, we picked up our five front doors from the salvage warehouse. This is going to be the exterior front door to the whole building:



It's nearly 4" thick, tall and wider than typical (39" if I remember right). We're planning to cut out the top two panels and replace them with glass to allow light into the RBB's common foyer.

This is one of the two identical doors to the tenants' units:



And this is one of a pair of narrow French doors that will be the entryway to our unit:



It's exciting to have them in our possession, even though they're just stacked in the garage for the time being. And not a moment too soon, since I went by the RBB today to sell someone an unused shower stall out of it and noticed that the wood at the top of the old front door has split and it's off its top hinge.