Innehållsförteckning för July/August 2025 från Old House Journal

Contributors in this issue OHJ COMES TO YOU FROM PEOPLE who are active participants in restoration work and the building arts. Others are design historians and accomplished architectural photographers. Many have been writing or taking photos for us for years; their names are familiar. Some pop in and out for a special story. Here are a few you’ll see in this issue of OHJ. BO SULLIVAN | Portland, Ore.: arcalus.com, bollingco.com A Swedish Arts & Crafts kitchen designed by Bo is featured on page 30. A designer and architectural historian, Bo was raised in an 1812 house in historic Beaufort, North Carolina; his parents were an antiques dealer and a biochemistry professor who owned a hardware store. After he received his architecture degree, Bo worked as a restoration carpenter before…

AMSTERDAM, NY / $594,900 Bracketed eaves and hooded, arched windows are classic Italianate markers of the 1854 John Kellogg house. Inside: a grand staircase with a spelter maiden on the newel post and plaster-ornamented ceilings. GADSDEN, AL / $495,000 Greek Revival details in the 1842 Thornton–Coates house include a centered pediment, entries with transom lights on both levels, and double-height columns. Inside, find high ceilings and original doors and mantels. WASHINGTON, GA / $587,000 Highland Cottage was built in 1827 in the Greek Revival style. Later enlarged, the mansion boasts a grand, colonnaded entry, generously proportioned double parlors, and a second-storey balcony. ST. JOSEPH, MO / $778,000 This hipped-roof Prairie Style mansion from 1906 has a deep, wraparound verandah and a spacious entry hall with a grand central staircase. Details…

The architectural historian and designer Bo Sullivan worked with the homeowners to create a kitchen that would meet all functional requirements, respect the 1894 house, and draw on the wife’s Swedish heritage. “Our kitchen should embrace the design, color, texture, patina, and craftsmanship [of] the hand-built places of the late-19th century,” she wrote in a project mission statement requested by Bo. The result is an unpretentious room that is personally meaningful. The trestle table, an early-20th-century Danish piece, became the model for saw-cut balusters on the rear basement stair. “The table was long,” says Bo, “but we didn’t want to cut it—so we created the inset bookcase to the floor, giving them space to push in or pull out the table for guests.” As is often the case in period…

Other than refinishing hardwood floors, the most common repair I’m called to do is floorboard replacement. The typical reasons we replace boards are termite or water damage, pet stains that blacken the boards to a point sanding won’t fix, and floor-plan changes that involve the removal of interior walls. • My goal is to find replacement boards that match the existing floor and integrate them. It takes skill and patience, but the payoff is another 100 years or more of use without having to resort to covering up the floor with carpet, vinyl, or new wood. The first thing I check is the species of the wood. Here in Florida we usually find flooring of heart pine, red oak, or white oak and, occasionally, Douglas fir. Online guides help identify…

Although mike and laura brosius had lived in cities across the country and abroad, their thoughts always came back to Astoria. A historic town on the northwest coast of Oregon, Astoria is a picturesque village of 19th-century homes set on steep, forested hills that overlook the Columbia River as it flows into the Pacific. The couple felt that this would be the perfect place in retirement. • They’d noticed the grand Victorian house, set high on one of the hills, and were drawn as much by its exuberant architecture as by its sweeping view. Built in 1892, the Queen Anne/Stick Style house had never been “remuddled,” inside or out. It had original stained-glass windows, ornate Eastlake-style hardware, and beautifully faux-grained woodwork. ROOM LAYOUTS had not been altered substantially. Mike and Laura…

PATIO DADDY-O Anybody remember Mamie Eisenhower Pink from the 1950s? The Palm Springs Umbrella from Boxhill (in partnership with DazeyLA) flawlessly captures the sugary sweet color. Ideal for a patio or by the pool, the capacious umbrella features alternating fringe-trimmed panels of white and bubblegum pink. Attached to a matte white, powder-coated aluminum center pole, the umbrella is made from marine-grade fabric mounted on a fiberglass skeleton. It’s equipped with a crank auto tilt with vent and valance. shopboxhill.com UMBRELLA SPECS • 9' in diameter with eight ribs • 75 lb. powder-coated steel umbrella base (matte white) • 10-year warranty • $1,593.12 including base Border Edging Reminiscent of bucolic English gardens with early wattle fencing, the Woven Willow fencing set from Terrain makes a natural edging material for planting beds.…

John and I bought our 1948 clapboard and Roman-brick Ranch from a friend who had lived here since the 1980s. Our friend had zero interest in taking care of the house, giving it no attention of any kind for at least 35 years. If the roof leaked, he ignored it. If the pipes froze in the cold, he ignored that. We couldn’t even get the house insured for the first few months until we tore off and replaced the roof, fascia, and gutters; painted the house; and removed a huge amount of overgrowth. But I could see what was underneath the filth and neglect: a small but sweet mid-century house with tremendous potential—the dream home of any soldier returning from the War. The awful greenish-brown carpeting covering the floors turned…

While you might think that air leaks are a problem only with older houses, we’ve tested old homes that are pretty airtight and brand-new homes that leak lots of air. Air leaks occur wherever there is a joint, gap, or hole in the rigid building materials that enclose a house, such as wall sheathing, framing, and drywall. • Making an existing house more airtight is pretty straight-forward: Find the holes and seal them up. Many air leaks can be found just by looking for spaces between framing and chimneys, electric boxes and drywall, and the mudsill and foundation. Contact an asbestos abatement specialist before doing any air-sealing if you have vermiculate insulation in the walls or otherwise suspect that there may be asbestos in the house. The fixes are often…

On nearly every old-house project, you will at some point be faced with the unpleasant reality that the thing standing between you and a beautifully finished room is original woodwork wearing about 13 layers of old paint. Removing paint may feel like an overwhelming task, especially when you’re looking at a house full of doors, baseboard and casing, built-ins, and windows (or exterior siding and trim). It’s tempting to just spruce things up with one more fresh coat of paint—we’ve all been there and done that. Still, there’s no denying that the “just-one-more-coat” mentality works for only so long. • Once you’ve come to terms with what must be done, you’re faced with the next decision: How the heck am I going to get all this paint off? Here’s an…

“Around dusk, the ospreys go fishing.” That’s what came to mind when the owner was asked about her favorite part of living in this home. Built in 1958, the Midcentury Modern house was recently renovated by Rill Architects of Bethesda, Maryland. Le Corbusier sought to design homes that were “machines for living”; from the moment Jim Rill and his team saw the property, they knew their task was to return this one to its rightful state as a “machine for appreciating nature.” The original design offered a getaway on one level, without air conditioning, its plan a simple cross. The house had been remodeled at least once before, at which time the second-floor “eyebrow” structure was added—and ceilings were dropped to accommodate ductwork. At the time, that may have been a…

Tucked into a fence, an arbor, a hedge, or a wall, the gate beckons us toward the entry or into garden rooms beyond. It may be purely decorative, or a discreet property marker—or it might provide privacy and even security. Designs changed with the era and from region to region. Fences and gates have a vast historical architectural vocabulary, so they are best designed starting with function. Then you can consider the material to be used, the period and style to be evoked, and the particulars of installation given climate and position in the garden. Whether in wood or metal, the gate should complement the house. Does the gate stand alone—a mere invitation in the landscape or at an arbor—or is it a hinged portion of the fence? Is it…

Extra Fancy “Fancy-Cutt” shingles from Custom Shingles are the heirs to historical shingles in decorative styles seen on house styles from Queen Anne to Eastlake. Milled from Western red, Alaskan yellow, or Eastern white cedar, they are offered in eight profiles: diamond, fishscale, half-round, arrow, sawtooth, dragon’s tooth, octagonal, and wavy. The most common shingle lengths are 16", 18" and 24". Capabilities include shingles up to 48” to meet historic details or project specifications. Fancy-Cutt shingles also come in teak or Wallaba (a South American wood) as well as composites primarily made from recycled materials. Custom shapes are also available. The Fancy-Cutts featured here include a mix of pre-stained diamond and wavy decorative shingles, all cut from Western red cedar. Call for a price quote on your project. customshingles.com Real…

? REPLACING A DAMAGED CLAPBOARD I have one cracked clapboard I’d like to replace. It has just a small amount of damage, so it might be possible to cut out only the bad section. How do I go about this? —Mike Geraghty, via email ✓ THE EDITORS of Fine Homebuilding reply: The hardest part about this job might be buying just one clapboard. In my area, they’re often sold in bundles of 10. Clapboards are fastened to the wall with nails (which are supposed to be driven into studs, not just the sheathing) near the bottom of each board. The next board above laps the one below by about ¾ in., holding the top of the lower board tight to the wall. The nails are supposed to be placed just high…

As Seattle’s population burgeoned, a local developer hired the Olmsted Brothers firm, in 1905, to design a park-like neighborhood, with curving, tree-lined boulevards, on what had been the site of logging activity and sawmills, southeast of downtown. The area was named Mount Baker owing to its views north over Lake Washington to that towering volcano in the Cascade Mountains. An enclave of picturesque bungalows and handsome Arts & Crafts-era homes soon were built. THE ARCHITECTURE AND PERIOD DETAILS ARE INTACT IN THIS 1912 HOUSE GENTLY RECONFIGURED FOR FAMILY LIVING TODAY. THE HISTORIC CRAFTSMAN-ERA HOUSE RETAINS ITS ORIGINAL ARCHITECTURE AND MANY PERIOD FITTINGS AND FIXTURES, NOW REVITALIZED TO UNDERPIN A SEAMLESS DESIGN UPDATE. Leslie and Paul Santarelli came to the neighborhood in 2018. They’d been looking for a larger family home, something…