I am not going to bore you with the details mainly because, I am too tired to relive it. The most important result of this job was Iris’ happiness. I will let these photos tell the story.

Often times there is a moisture issue that needs to be addressed which prompts the make over; like a leaking shower pan or toilet or  rotted cabinets or mold issues. Perhaps it’s a damaged sink, toilet or  floor tiles that require attention. It is not uncommon for one problem spot to effect another element of the room, opening the proverbial can of worms.  For example, the new cabinet that has a smaller ‘foot print’ than the old cabinet, exposing a huge gap in the floor. The point is, you may end up spending a little more  money than you originally anticipated for the job. That is why planning and foresight are so important.

In the case of the room pictured below, it was important to the home owners, to remove the giant back to back his and her vanities from the middle of the room. No problem. This requires relocating plumbing and electrical a new floor, some drywall work and painting, as well as new cabinetry and lighting. With all that, there was still a huge savings because the toilet, tub and shower where left as they were. In the end the home owners were able to have exactly what they were looking for, an open space  with a lot of light and fresh feeling.

If you are considering relocating plumbing and/or walls, of course you are looking at much more labor and expense. In a small bathroom these are not usually on the agenda unless you are thinking of expanding the bathroom into a neighboring room or closet. In some instances a person will want to remove (or add) soffits, rearrange the lighting and exhaust fans which will call for some minor drywall work.

In the case of the two jobs pictured below, bath tubs were removed and a shower put in their place. Obviously, this calls for the removal of the tub, relocating the drain in the floor and recapitulating the diverter plumbing. If this were the only tub in the home, I would advise against it because, the day will come when you will wish you had a tub to soak in.

Each of these jobs required new ceilings due to the changing of ceiling exhaust fans and removing soffits and new lighting arrangments. Aside from that, the only other drywall work was to the walls due to removing those gigantic wall  mirrors, relocating outlets and switches, relocating the plumbing to accommodate for the larger vanities and the removal of the side wall medicine cabinets. All the tile in the bathrooms were replaced including the floor tiles and the marble window sill. The photos were taken prior to the frame-less glass door installations.

A final note of caution. A lot of people are getting rid of those old wall to wall mirrors and medicine cabinets and replacing them with ornamental mirrors and larger vanities with lots of drawers in lieu of a medicine cabinet. I just want to point out that if you decide to remove these large mirrors by yourself , it can be done. I remove them on my own all the time. Just know that they are extremely heavy (you may want to enlist a helper). Also know that they are not safety glass, when broken they turn into shards and can cause serious damage to you and your property, ie. flooring, counter tops and tubs, etc.

I have yet to do a ceiling job that didn’t turn into a major re-do. Often I get the paint, molding, tile, kitchen, bath, doors and all sorts of work and referrals from one ceiling job, done right. These photos show a recent job where the ceilings were 16 feet high in some areas and the skylight boxes as high as 20 feet. The home owner did not want a scaffold in the house so I did it all with ladders (this also sucks). The textured walls remain as they were. Each wall had a different texture. Due to the mold damage found in almost every room in the house, many areas of the drywall had to be removed and finished to match the existing. In spite of my misgivings about pulling this off, I surprised myself. Even I have a hard time seeing where the patch work was done. So I’m happy about that.

The happy eventuality of all this is a clean and updated look. In this home  3/4″ X 6-1/2″ square stock was used as base molding and 3/4″ X 3-1/2″ square stock became the casement around the doors and simple 4-5/8″ Colonial crown was used on the lower ceiligs and 6-1/4′ up high. Also on the exterior French doors I installed a wood valance right in the jamb to hide the window shade hardware. In the guest bedroom where there is a sliding glass door I built in a valance across the span of the room made of drywall and hand matched the texture of the existing walls. This way, the crown molding is installed directly on the valance, so that it looks like, it was always there as part of the walls and continues that clean look.

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Speaking of which the Keys house belonged to and was enjoyed by our family, for two generations. It hadn’t been utilized since the last of the kids grew up and stopped using it for weekend partying. Apparently, it was commandeered by crack addicts and was facing condemnation and razing. Although we had family in the Keys who are contractors, when they drove by to see if it could be sold,they didn’t want to work on it. I drove down from Pembroke Pines, to see it for myself. That started a good six weeks of hard ass work with a 2-1/2 hour commute every day. The good news is, after replacing just about everything except the walls (all cement,even interior) and the ceiling (tongue and groove Dade pine) we did turn a profit within a few months. These houses are called conch houses. Many were built during the prohibition by Rum Runners from the Bahamas to stash booze in and are also known as Rum Houses, as we believe, was the case with this one.

The next three photos are of  a home in Boca Raton, where I painted everything from the roof itself, down to the drive way and patio. The idea with the driveway was to faux finish it to mimic the brick accent of the facade. I sprayed multiple coats of Xylene based stain of  brick red and charcoal grey, back and forth until I achieved the right mix of color. It’s a process I call “smoking the paint”. I don’t know the technical name, or what any one else calls it, nor do I care.

In the last photos is a home in Weston Hills Country Club. My customers here got semi-screwed over by the previous painters because, they used sub standard paint and preparation. It’s not uncommon to see new concrete stucco facades being painted with no primer, almost as fast as it takes for the stucco to dry. That’s a big mistake. If you can not wait the full sixty days for the stucco to cure then, it’s important to use Crete-Seal or a similar product as a primer. If you simply paint over uncured, unsealed cement it will cast a green-grey tone in about six months to a year. We settled on Benjamin Moore’s, Moore Guard in satin finish. Cafe Royal is the main body and the trim is also Cafe Royal at 25%.

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I’ve included another job where I installed over 5,000 linear feet of triple crown molding. The majority of the triple crown molding was installed in step-like, tray ceilings.The trays go up 18-20 feet, in the center of the rooms. This was all installed and painted using a ladder and working alone. How did I do it?  Well, that’s an ancient Chinese secret, Grasshopper.

I also wanted to include a couple photos of the remodel of Jackie Gleason’s last residence where the new owner wanted to lose the retro look and create more of an old world look. This involved my building arches and 28 columns from scratch to create a square portico effect at the perimeter of the sunken living room. It also involved creating a coffered ceiling with triple crown molding. All of the crown molding was faux finished, with three different gold paints and then antiqued with amber poly-urethane. The posts of the columns were painted deep bronze (almost black) and also antiqued the same way. From the bottom of the living room floor to the top of the tray ceiling measured 18 feet. The columns measured 14 feet. On this job I cheated. I used a scaffold.

I’m also including some other photos of crown molding.

As a side note all of these jobs were also painted by me, as well.

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Finally every inch of dry wall including ceilings had to be re-shmootzed. (shmootz is bill speak for dry wall compound, caulking and anything that is shmootzy) and then primed.

Next I replaced the floor. All of it. This house had four different flooring materials which along with the wall paper really gave it a boxed in feeling.

All the vanities in the bathrooms were completely replaced and granite tops were added along with new faucets,plumbing, of course, and toilets etc.

In the kitchen, the cabinet boxes were still good. I refaced them with maple wood veneer stained in cherry and new maple doors and hardware, plumbing fixtures and a microwave oven was added. The counter top was replaced with granite and the sink counter extended 12 in. beyond the half wall to create a short bar into the dining area.

The floor was replaced with 20 in. porcelain tile set on a bias throughout the house and is now the only flooring material. This adds to the over all flow of the homes layout, to have a continuous floor. It’s important to use a similar  grout color, like the tile, to prevent ending up with a checker board look. The paint also, is the same neutral color through out the house for the same reason. Ben Moore (OC2) “Pale Almond”

Here’s the result:

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Gent's Bath

Gent's Bath

Gent's Bath

This one (above) was a total tear out and reconfiguration of all fixtures,floor, walls and lighting. Only the toilet and shower are in the same locations as before. I designed this to accommodate a nine foot vanity with double sinks,two linen cabinets,two reach under storage and nine full sized drawers. Added six foot medicine cabinet assembly (mirrored inside and out).There is plenty of storage. Oh, and a separate, built-in linen closet (overkill on the storage). New shower stall with 1/2″ frame-less glass enclosure with a saloon style swinging door and added a Whirlpool tub where the plumbing was reversed so that the spigot wasn’t hidden behind the linen cabinet.

Gent's Bath

Gent's Bath-2

Gent's Bath

Again, I’m using the mirrored medicine cabinets and the solid wood vanities with custom granite tops(above).This is another gentleman’s bath. I remodeled this entire house including all the 7″ crown molding upstairs and downstairs (I’ll post that some other time). We saved the master bath for last. I think it was worth the wait.

This one (below) was done for single mom-type professional powerhouse lady. It’s another total tear out, down to the studs. I broke out the floor to re-configure the plumbing. She was willing to sacrifice counter space in order to gain space for a shower/tub where the tiny shower stall once stood, in the corner. This is not a very big space for a master bath but I squeezed it in. I don’t know how.

Lucky Lady

Lucky Lady_2

Lucky Lady_3

This is my tile pattern that I like to use when a customer wants an old world feel. Because of the limited space I incorporated  nooks into the walls for places to set things. I’ve noticed that a lot of women like the gun metal or dark bronze tone fixtures while men tend to opt for the satin nickle. At the time this photo was taken,we were waiting for my glass guy Sean, to come with the frame-less tub surround.

This is another professional, single mom, master bath(below). On this one she did not want to replace the vanities or tub. Not a lot of demo, just the shower and floor. My challenge was to translate all this plastic cultured marble into something that made sense, with the new tile. This is where paint color can really go to work for you.

Mothers Master Bath

Mothers Master Bath

Mothers Master Bath

Mothers Master Bath_4

We’re waiting for the shower surround here,too. In this picture you can see how I made the transition from the tub back splash (under the window) continue right through the shower’s tile pattern.

I’m not a hundred percent loving the white cabinets. Overall the job looked pretty good.

……..and that’s what I did on my summer vacation.