hidden treasure

when we first saw this house, we knew there was a series of changes we'd have to undergo to help it function again as a home for 1 family.  it's legally registered as a 3-family house, so for the non new-yorkers, that means the building has been divided into 3 apartments.  the last owner lived on the garden and parlor level floors (and had access to the cellar), and there were tenants in the individual apartments on the third and fourth floors.  each had its own kitchen and separate entrances, most of which will be removed as part of our renovation.

the good news is that the most extensive boundary that separated the owner's duplex from the upper apartments was carefully constructed a number of years ago.  a partition wall and door were put on the parlor floor along the staircase to create privacy between the parlor floor and upper levels.  it was integrated fairly well and almost gave the feel of a single family home.  nonetheless, we decided after moving in that the first thing to knock down would be this privacy wall.  we were hopeful that the demolition would uncover the rest of the wooden staircase and that it would be well preserved!

so over a couple of hot days and nights in july, hubby and my dad decided to take on this task by themselves, armed with an assortment of power tools, handheld precision instruments and intuition about how to reverse engineer the handiwork.  in hindsight, i can't believe how quickly they were able to get through the various layers.  the pictures that follow show the different demolition stages (click on any to enlarge the image).

before the demo:
the first picture details a close up of the plywood inside the stairway arch that was part of the partition wall.  if you look towards the middle of the second picture past the wood paneling on the left wall, you can see the outline of the door frame that was another entry point into the owner's duplex.  in the third picture, on the other side of the arch, you can see the back of that same entry door and the wall on the other side of the stairway.

the demo!

over 2 1/2 days, hubby and my dad went to work!

the first cut!

bye bye wall!

cutting through the drywall

making progress...

the first sight of wood!

it's still there!

stained glass at top of the arch

removing the door frame

looking through arch into middle parlor

open again!

the finished product!

we can't believe how much taking the wall down has changed the look and feel of the parlor!  i'm so thankful that someone took the time to erect the wall as carefully as they did so many years ago.  the original beauty and craftsmanship were well protected and will only require some relatively minor touch-up work to repair the areas that were damaged.