Landis LCC

When we first visited this vintage three story townhouse, built in 1900, it was clear that it would require a complete renovation. As both the owner and the design/build remodeler for this whole house remodel, our main focus was on maximizing value, while restoring several key historically-significant elements of the house, as these were also of value for resale.

The house had 2400 square feet of space on the first, second and third floors. By digging out, waterproofing and finishing the basement, we made it into a 3000 square foot house. We restored and improved the exterior envelope of the house. This included historically accurate windows, a new roof, re-pointing, cleaning and repairing the front masonry façade, rebuilding four walls that comprised the rear elevations of the house, adding a rooftop deck and re-doing the front and rear yards .

We opened up and completely remodeled the kitchen area so that it was integrated with the dining and living areas at the front of the house. We also added a half bathroom adjacent the kitchen, remodeled three bathrooms and added one additional bathroom in the basement.

We added high efficiency two zone heating and cooling systems. While the house originally had a boiler and radiators, we could not keep the system as it was completely depreciated and reduced the floor space in several key areas. We sistered all of the joists on the first, second, and third floors which allowed us to remove a central bearing wall.

On the interior we restored two marble fireplaces , strengthened, leveled and restored the staircase; salvaged, reinstalled and refinished heart- of-pine floors; and restored and added antique hardware to the front door. Although we replaced all of the interior doors and trim, we selected materials that were consistent with those we removed. We redesigned the living space on the second floor to create an elegant master bedroom/bathroom suite. We integrated a laundry center on the second floor and a rear bedroom with its own bathroom. On the third level, we restored the existing floor plan, but added three closets. Parts of the front were also power washed to remove soot and stains.

As one can see from the first floor design plan, we removed almost all of the existing first floor partition walls and opened up the interior space to have an almost loft-like feel. High quality Crystal kitchen cabinets and stainless steel appliances were installed along with level 5 Blue Eyes granite counters to make the kitchen an architectural focal point. The new owners of the house really enjoy entertaining on this level.

There were two existing old marble fireplace mantles/surrounds in the house. While some remodelers might have chosen to replace the mantles, we took special effort to restore them. This required hiring a specialist to have them polished and detailed in place. One of the fireplaces’ mantles was so stained that we decided to obtain a salvaged one, refinish it, and install it. It matched almost perfectly. We invested over $2,000 to restore both of these fireplaces.

Restoring the original staircase from the first to third levels was particularly challenging. The staircases were at least an inch out of level. We sistered the stringers with new LVL’s and jacked up and also sistered the headers in order to level and strengthen the stairwell. We turned a number of new oak pickets to match existing ones and opened up the stairwell on the main level to increase the space visually. The existing flooring on all three levels of the house was fastened directly to the joists. In order to strengthen the flooring, we pieced in plywood sub-flooring between the joists from underneath. This strengthened the floors and added to the life span of the antique heart pine.

In order to improve the energy efficiency of this house, we invested in having Icynene insulation sprayed onto the underside of the entire roof, all exterior stud bays and all exterior basement walls. This, in combination with fiberglass insulation between floors and on interior walls for soundproofing, made the project particularly tight. We also had to underpin the two party walls in order to lower the basement. This required careful planning and execution in order to complete the work safely and effectively. In order to restore some of the front, we had to make a number of new bricks to match the existing white ones. At first we thought the bricks were limestone. When we discovered that they were solid cinderblock dipped in white concrete, we experimented and figured out how to make new matching ones on site.

One of our biggest challenges was access during the project. Parking was very difficult and the rear of the house did not have alley access. Everything that came in and out of the house had to be done by hand including dirt, concrete, and demolition materials. The only thing we had boomed into the house was the drywall package. Working with the
neighbors was also time-consuming as the house was almost a complete gut and underpinning the party walls required their written consent.

At the rear of the house, there was an existing two story structure that ended up having to be taken down completely because it had inadequate footings and was subject to the elements after we had demolished much of it. Due to safety considerations and quality concerns, we decided to take down a good deal of brickwork we had hoped to save.

As an indication of how we added value to this property, we sold it in less than two weeks for about five percent over the asking price.