Papercut injuries

I guess you can't die from them, but they sure are annoying. My fingers are covered with them after 4 hours of signing letters, folding them, stuffing them into envelopes, sealing those envelopes, stamping them and sticking on address labels. I'm ready to drop them in the mail later this aft or first thing in the morning, so that 200 of our closest neighbors are apprised of our plans for the RBB. Don't mind doing it but really hope that after all this trouble they let us have our freakin' conservatory.

On the agenda

We're on the agenda for the two neighbourhood groups' meetings in late December/early January to ask for their support for our appeal to the Zoning Board (for the garden house and to use the RBB's basement as living space). I spent the morning at City Hall trying to get the names and addresses, not just of all the property owners who can see the top of our building from their own, but also of all their tenants, since all the buildings in our neighborhood are multi-family. I came away with a list of the 47 names and addresses of the building owners but have been getting conflicting information about how to obtain the names of the buildings' residents. Either a list of their names will arrive by email this aft or I'll have to make another trip to City Hall tomorrow and try to get it. Then this weekend we'll be drafting a letter to all the affected residents (I'm guessing about 250 names) explaining our proposal and afterwards I'll have the unenviable task of addressing and stuffing all the envelopes early next week. I'm feeling very in-the-trenches.

ISD application submitted...and a new mantel

On Monday we submitted our application to renovate the RBB to the city's Inspectional Services Department. That gets the ball rolling and clock ticking down the path to a rejection of our plans, neighborhood hearings, an appeal date and - hopefully - approval to build! It's such a relief to be out of the stage of eternally hounding the architects for drawings and answers to various building code questions, even if this next part of the process is sure to come with pitfalls of its own. Fingers crossed that we can get the rejection letter from the City soon, since we have our first presentation to a neighborhood association (there are two such groups on our neighborhood) at the end of December and are supposed to bring that letter to the meeting.

In other news, I bought the mantel for our fireplace today. In a sense it's not what I expected it to be, but in another sense it is. I wish I had photos for you, but we stopped by an architectural salvage place on a whim and of course I didn't have my camera. I had in mind something like the ones in the images above: marble, intricately but above all delicately carved, with an arched opening, and quite large. Instead, we ended up with a wood mantel, regular rectangular opening. It's stripped oak and we might leave it stripped, or else possibly paint it white. What sold me on it were the carvings...they are absolutely stunning. They're not chunky at all like so many mantels, with leaves and swirls, rather than overly feminine roses/flowers. My bf is pleased with the absence of flowers and also by the fact that the mantel is wood, which he far prefers to marble. I can't say I wasn't swayed by the price, either, which was fabulous, even for an wood number, never mind the saving over marble. I'd rather economize here so we hopefully can go big with the budget elsewhere. My only concern is with the size of the mantel. It's a bit smaller than what I had pictured. But our RBB is pretty small, so I'm hoping the proportions are right when we install it.

Art for the red brick building

Yup, work continues to be bogged down by the architects.

Meanwhile, I had a fabulous time at a Skinner auction yesterday and scored these two amazing paintings for very short dollars. I'm so excited I just had to show them off!

I wasn't kidding about it being very slow going

Hence the lack of posts. Despite the fact that our contractor pulled a permit to begin re-doing the Red Brick Building's roof, and our architects promised to have us the plans by the first week of September, it's only last week that they were turned over to the structural engineer for him to be able to do his engineering drawings. Yup, it's been six weeks of hounding and hounding and even more hounding of architects. Not fun. But we are hoping to have turned a corner, and the engineer promised us the plans by tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I've been doing a little showroom visiting today and last week, since some of the spatial dimensions within the rooms are becoming more defined. I visited a local appliance showroom and did a quick whip 'round Sears' appliance section, for comparison purposes. I went in with some "musts" and came out with a few strong contenders.

For the tenants, we're going with all stainless, since that's what most people seem to like these days. A side-by-side fridge/freezer, since it strikes me as the most "neutral" choice (not deciding whether the future tenants are more from-scratch cooks or frozen food reheaters). The Bosch was the clear winner among those I saw, in terms of attractiveness, a feeling of quality, good internal illumination and space configuration. Plus it has the ice/water dispenser in the door, which is a nice touch. For their range, I liked the Bosch and the GE Cafe model. The Cafe seems a little more practical and intelligently designed, the Bosch is a little more elegant-looking and has the "brand-name" factor. Also, apparently if you buy several applicances from the same manufacturer you get a discount. And the saleswoman was saying that the Bosch dishwashers or washers and dryers (I forget which) are the highest rated. But I haven't even gotten to dishwashers and laundry yet. It feels less urgent since there are fewer variables in terms of size and hook-up.

For our own unit, I want white appliances, a French door fridge and a gas cook-top on our free-standing (or rather, as I learned it is called, "slide-in") range. My favorite fridge was the KitchenAid, though there was a Whirlpool Gold that was acceptable, if cheaper-feeling, and half the price. This after going back and forth about whether we need an in-door ice and water dispenser, consulting with my cutie and deciding we don't. Our range was trickier, because I want something white and attractively designed and my boyfriend wants something similar to the Thermador in our rental, which means something more professional style. My other requirements are something with a decently big oven, 4 burners, no or minimal backsplash, and no gimmicky electronics. This morning I went to a showroom that specializes in ranges and deals mostly with European brands. In particular, I wanted to check out Blue Star, Aga and, if possible, see a white KitchenAid range.

Well, after strolling around the showroom and speaking to one of the salespeople, I fell in love with the Blue Star. It reminds me of the ranges I cooked on in restaurants with its open, flush and dropped-in burners. And it comes in white! (as well as over 100 other colors) Apparently the oven is the most capacious of any range its size and the broilers get mega-hot. There's a convection fan to keep things baking evenly, a pull out foil-lineable drawer that catches spills and crumbs, you can take the grate off for true wok cooking, and unlike the Thermador, the simmer setting maintains an evenly low simmer, rather than switching on and off on a timer. So enamored am I that I am even tempted by the possibility of adding a 12 inch grill to the 4-burner 30 inch model that I was originally eyeing, so getting the 36 inch model instead.

Of the other options, the Aga did nothing for me (can't see what's going on inside, except with one model, has non-continuous burner plates, and little ovens which, the saleswoman told me, take surprisingly long to heat up). I think it's best for someone who's a real back-to-basics kind of person (which I emphatically am not). The KitchenAid they had on show wasn't white and it had lots of electronics to control the oven. Plus, it just doesn't hold its own, style and heft-wise with the pro-style ranges. The surprise of the visit was an Italian brand called Ilve which was gorgeous. Comes in a half-dozen colors including white and optional copper trim. Cute styling and nobs, but pricier than the BlueStar (which itself isn't cheap), non-continuous grates and none of the other advantages of the BS.

After these visits, it feels great to know what I'm putting on the appliance wish list. We'll still need to cost it all out, though, before we reach any decisions.

Our first building permit!

We just got our very first building permit for the RBB: it's for the new roof. Our contractor and code consultant went down to the municipal building department and pulled the permit for us this morning. Had I received this news a couple of months ago, I would have thought it was no big deal, but I now know that getting to do this much work on a short form (which doesn't need all kinds of plans to be submitted and a longer wait) is a pretty spectacular thing to pull off. We're so excited! And so pleased with and impressed by those two members of our project team. Our contractor says he can start the work in two weeks' time.

Very slow going

Progress on the red brick building has been very slow, hence the lack of new posts.

Today we met with the architects to restate the priorities we gave them a month ago. 1) Get four details checked/worked out on the engineer's drawings of the roof so we can give the go ahead to our contractor to begin construction. 2) Figure out what the building code requires of us in terms of emergency egress in case of fire. 3) Decide where the utilities are going to go in the basement so we can get our contractor moving pipes and wires around. 4) Analyze the facade to know what changes, if any, we'll make to the windows and doors there. Locate the new fireplace so we can get a mason in to brick up to windows at the back of the building and put in the new fireplace/chimney.

Over the past month, there's been activity related to these points, but nothing that actually puts us in a position to start altering the building's structure yet.

We've also had a wood flooring guy come in to look at our existing floors (which are in very rough shape) and he recommended laying new ones. That's what everyone has been telling us so far. He told me about a place in Portland, Maine that has a good selection of old, reclaimed lumber, so the plan is to head up there one weekend. Meanwhile, I found a gorgeous, inspiring, herringbone-patterned floor in a shop here in Boston. It's very pale in color: old, unstained, unfinished oak. I want to approximate that look on our living level using the old pine framing that we've been pulling down. We'll likely need to buy some wood too, though, since what we can salvage from other parts of the building won't be enough to cover its floor square footage.