The weather remains dry and in the 80s to 90s with the occasional thunderstorm that does nothing to water the grass or alleviate the heat. It cools down just enough at night to keep the inside of the house cool during the day, which is great for the trim carpenters working on the interior, but not much relief for the deck installers. At least their work area is in the shade of the porch roof. While the deck installers first said they were working exclusively on the weekends, it looks like they came in on the weekdays too, to complete all of the side of the house and start on the front curve. The rough carpenters are also hard at work in the same area finishing off the arches so they're ready to paint. Post wrap will still need to be installed before the painters can come through, so there's a bit of work left. Lots of fine woodworking going into the house before the final push with paint, floors, finished electrical, and finished plumbing.
From a distance, the appearance of the front of the house hasn't changed much, but if you look closer, you can see some new details. Every trip, it's getting harder and harder to find where all the weeks changes are. It takes two sets of eyes to spot all the new installs and I'm even spotting changes in my pictures rather than in person.
Signs of the final finish on the front porch are becoming more evident if you look closely. While I still don't know the final design of this curved section of the front porch, there are hints to how it will be finished. A piece of white Azek was curved to fit the fascia hiding the angular beams that support the curved roof porch. There's also a shorter piece of cedar trim that will sit above it to add to the profile. There's a piece of trim that sits proud of the flat underside, installed on the inside of the beam cover. This implies that we're not going to try to carry the arches into this area, but I don't know for certain. It seems like there needs to be something at the top of each post since there are arches between the posts on the straight sections.
The three arches on the front porch to the right of the front door are completed so all that's left is to finish the deck fascia and install the post covers. After the post covers are constructed, railing can be installed. We're going with a composite top rail that matches the deck color with black powder coated round balusters. The intent is to make the railing as subdued as possible so it doesn't become much of a visual feature. To that, we avoided white and lighter colors since the posts will be painted white. I hope it works.
The crown molding in this section was also completed. This is one of those details that are easily overlooked if you're not keeping a mental note that they need to be completed. For some reason, they didn't get this done right away, so the painters didn't get a chance to caulk it with the rest of the trim. It will be caulked before paint since there are a few exterior doors that still need to be installed and caulked. Since the rest of the crown has already been installed, this completes this design element. There are some trim places on the back porch that need to be revisited, but for the most part the ceilings in the porches are completed.
A large portion of the front porch was completed, as well as the pie slices that go around the curve. Due to either the errors in design or errors in implementation from the previous build team, the posts on the round part of the front porch aren't spaced evenly. We even had to add a post later to make the spacing appear more distributed. Last visit, I made a design decision with the porch installer to make the pie slices adhere to the position of the posts rather than having them all be the same size around the curve. I was beginning to second guess this decision because I was worried that the unequal slices would look more obvious than not having the divisions land on the porch posts. Now that I see this in person, I'm happy with the decision I made. The slices seem to be close enough in size to no detract from the appearance, and it's much nicer to have the partitions land on the posts.
This is close to what the final design will look like. The borders of the slices run from the corner of the house to the posts and sit atop of some additional 2x6 supports added to the framing of the deck. Because we spaced the deck framing at 12" on center, the Azek feels very solid with little to no bounce. There are some parts around the curve where, due to the diagonal installation of the deck boards, there's more space between supports. If the deck installers don't address these places, it's an easy matter to add additional support underneath.
The division that bisects the curved porch is getting a double dividing deck board for appearance. This is how all the other slice dividers meet at the corner of the house. You can see in the upper part of the picture, the deck installers attach the boards oversized and later score and cut the section dividers in place. This ensures the most accurate installation and cleanest final appearance.
Here's a close up of how the border fits against the long boards when it's completed. Very clean lines and near invisible fasteners. The "invisible" fasteners space the deck boards about 1/8" apart for water shedding. Since all the boards are the same thickness, you don't have to worry about the butt joints causing snags. Even milled dimensional deck boards will encounter some swelling and thickness variations during processing, and the uniform Azek makes for a very clean looking deck.
Here's a closer look at the double border boards that comes off the corner of the house. The double board border will nicely split the post and provides a nice symmetry to the two slices. The post covers will sit on top of the deck with the railing attaching to the posts. We've discussed making the railing curved to follow the deck, which will have to be sent to a special fabricator, so before we commit to it, we'll need to double check the radius of the curve since using a template isn't feasible.
Here's what the side deck looks like from the back, looking forward. The boards are installed in full length sections, unstaggered, and each section will be delineated by a border board, which is why you see a gap. The boards will be trimmed so the width of a single board can fit the gap, creating the same tight gap that the round part has.
More of the water channeling materials were purchased and sit ready to install. There's one more short section around the corner, close to the greatroom exterior door. Once that's installed, the deck boards in that section can be installed. A limestone sill still needs to be installed under the door, and it looks like it will impinge upon the deck boards, so I think that needs to be attached so the deck boards can cut to length.
Here's a closer look at the hidden fastening system. The black cleats screw down into the deck joists and small tongues engage the grooves in the sides of the board. This is done every deck joist, so in effect, the board is mechanically attached to the joists, similar to a conventional installation of a face screw through the board.
Moving inside, the french doors were installed in the study/foyer. There's plastic sheeting applied to the glass panes on each side, which were painted opaque with primer. The plastic will remain on the glass until the final paint is applied. There's a strip of hardwood applied to the "non-functioning" door on the right and a hole drilled on the functioning door on the left. Non-functioning is a bit of a misnomer since they can both open, but the left must open before the right, and there's a locking astragal that's only accessible when the left door is open.
Here's what the door looks like with the operational door open. The light switch in the room is on the left, next to the non-functioning door. We have a good idea what hardware we want for all the doors, but haven't put it down on paper yet; something we'll soon need to consider. There's already enough space under the doors, all doors for that matter, to fit the wood floor.
Here's the edge of the non-functioning door and the hardwood that will be cut to accept the strike plate. Pictured is also the locking astragal that will keep the door stationary without the use of a door handle. Some french doors will have a functioning door handle what will actuate a rod at the top and bottom of the door. This is a simpler mechanism. The lever can swing vertically and actuates a short rod up into the top of the door frame to lock the door.
Distinctive Designs have started plotting out the design for the paneling in the great room. There are some samples areas mocked up, showcasing ideas around the window, and a few trim profiles. The baseboard remains in place and the panels are created to fit on them. The panel flats will form a grid in line with the windows so the layout kind of creates itself. The devil is in the details.
Here's a close up of how the windows will be trimmed. Rather than using the stepped window trim like the rest of the house, there will just be a narrow bead detail, then the flat of the panel frame sandwiched between another narrow bead. What comes after that, on the inside of the panel, is still being decided upon. Shown here is one idea, a bevel that adds two shadow lines providing a clean look.
One of the other examples is to use the same step that's on the baseboard and window trim, to transition down to the flat panel. Although this uses the same element as the rest of the trim, we don't think we like how this one looks. For some reason, it's a bit distracting and makes too many shadow lines. While it has clean lines, it looks too busy.
The last idea is to just have the narrow bead and no other transition to the panel. I kind of like this look, but I always tend to stray more spartan, so it's not always a good idea to go with my preference. I think that since the coffered ceiling has some cove molding detail, it's probably best to add some more detail to the wall panels, even if it is just a little bevel.
I don't think I showcased this detail in the blog yet. It's the modified trim on the door between the kitchen and mudroom. Because of the cabinets, we weren't able to use the full width of the door trim, so Distinctive Designs modified the trim to include the two steps, but removed much of the flat portion. This retains the look, but fits the space. I think the top trim piece was scaled down to fit below the crown molding of the cabinets as well.
The top door trim comes up just shy of the cabinet crown so if it wasn't intentional, it was super lucky You can see that the miter between the side and top trim isn't on a perfect diagonal since the width of the side trim is narrower. Despite that, the step details line up as much as possible and I think this offers a good solution to a difficult space,
The fire rated garage entry doors aren't installed yet, but are moved into position so I think they're going to install them soon. Much of the carpenters tools, both rough and fine are moved out into the garage now that the primary drywall mudding is completed. We still need a coat of primer and paint in here, which will probably be shot when the rest of the house is painted. Garage doors should be coming soon and my next, delayed, update will hopefully include them.
All the baseboard molding has been installed in the upstairs rotunda and some progress was made on the crown, but there's still some sections left to complete. The baseboard molding made it's way into the elevator alcove up here, which will need to be removed after inspection so we can open up the drywall and install doors to use it as a closet space until we install the elevator. The stair railing is resting on the stairs and all the rotunda railing is in the turret bedroom, so I'm hoping that will be completed soon.
We decided to bring out the laundry base cabinets by a couple inches to reduce the amount of space the washer and dryer will protrude. It's just a perception between the cabinet and machines, but the little change can make the room feel different. The base cabinets aren't so far out as to make reaching the wall cabinets difficult and the washer and dryer alcoves are the same depth.
The machine alcoves will be painted to match the gray cabinets so everything will look uniform. It's sized to fit a front loader with pedestal. While the top of the alcove is pretty high, it's still functional as a temporary shelf for laundry related goods. The upper cabinets above the machines will be mostly inaccessible due to the depth of the machines so opting for an open face will allow us to just use baskets up there. A board was also added to the underside of these cabinets and will also be painted to match the rest.
All the baseboard and crown was installed in the turret and turret bedroom, completing the space. All that's left for this room is paint and flooring. The baseboard really highlights the continuous bottom window trim and the crown ties it all in together.
The rest of the turret bedroom is also completed with baseboard trim. It's a pretty straight forward install, save for the small section of curved wall. Distinctive design just used the standard baseboard and managed to curve it to fit the radius of the walls. The rotunda rails are in the bathroom, as well as other pieces of the final stairway trim.
The basement had it's last interior doors installed under the stairs and in the future bathroom. There will be other doors in the future once we get around to finishing the basement space, but I'm hoping I'll be able to do a lot of that labor myself. In the mean time, we'll probably use the basement for storage and workout, in its intended spaces, and use the rest of it for a play space.
The ceiling of the rotunda has been applied and is awaiting stain and paint. I'm really liking how this turned out. The current color gives it a sauna-like look, but I think the final dark stain will lend the space a more outdoorsy feel. Now that this part is completed, All the outdoor ceilings have officially been installed. We're planning on painting the dividing trim pieces white and staining the rest of the cedar beadboard a dark mahogany to match the exterior doors.
The additional corbels have also been installed on the greatroom exterior. We decided to add five more, three on the back and one on each side corner, since it just seemed too bare without them. I'm glad we did because it really ties in the look to the rest of the greatroom. A paper wasp queen was also staring up a hive on our overhang, but it looks like it was taken care of during the corbel installation. The hive remains, but I didn't see any activity on it.
Here's a longer shot of the back of the greatroom with the newly installed corbels. I didn't see any scaffolding set up so they must have climbed some really long ladders to get up there. Some of the siding needed to be cut away to accommodate the corbel blocking, but it looks like they took care of it well.
That's about it for this week. I'll be taking a short break from updates and will miss two weekends worth of progress, so the next update should be a big one. This will be the first updates I'll miss in years, and I hope it's the last. The next update will put us into July, a mere 8 weeks until the end of August, so I'm hoping we're still on track for an August completion. There's still so much that needs to be done, but I'm hoping it won't take long. Painting, wood floors, the rest of the tile, finished electrical, finished plumbing. The list might be short, but the minute tasks are plentiful.
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