Preservation of Historic Winchester

As we saw in the last update to the Samuel Noakes House project, the work on the house is nearly complete. PHW and the owner are partnering to show off the finished project on March 9. Keep a sharp eye out for more details and ticket sale information in the next two weeks!

We continue our journey through the renovation process at the Samuel Noakes House at 101 West Cork Street/201 South Braddock Street. Updates are posted each Tuesday through the PHW blog, following the progress with virtual hardhat tours. The previous entries may be found at the PHW blog at part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12, part 13, part 14, part 15, part 16, part 17, part 18, and part 19.

For those who were able to tour the Noakes house during the Holiday House Tour, you may have heard the docent in the Cork Street side explaining about the future flooring plans for this area. During the tours, only the subflooring visible in the Cork Street apartment. Now the promised finished floor of cork and bamboo have been installed.

One item that had many people curious on the tour was how the access door to the basement in the Cork Street side would be handled. Instead of the open hole as we saw on the tour, the new door has been installed, creating an access hatch to the water heaters. As you can see, the cork flooring was installed on the hatch door to help it blend seamlessly into the rest of the flooring. A different shade of cork flooring was used in the rear bedroom, and bamboo finishes out the upper kitchen and dining area on Cork Street. Several nee built ins have also been installed in the Cork Street dining/living area since the Holiday House Tour.

There is also a huge change in the appearance of the floors in the Braddock Street side. The downstairs floors and stair treads have been sanded down to prepare for the finish coat. In several places, such as the hall and laundry room, you can see where the new flooring has been installed where the existing flooring had been too damaged or altered to retain. One question that came up several times on the tour was why did a circa 1810 home have such narrow floorboards. The original floor was of wide planks, but over the years new flooring was laid atop the old — as well as new ceilings installed dropped down! In the stripping process, the owner decided to stop at this layer of flooring due to its relatively good condition, as the sanding has revealed.

At this point, you may want to take a moment to remind yourself of the Noakes house flooring at the start of the project. It might be hard to believe the worn floors in the Braddock Street space could be salvaged!

Flooring installed at Cork Street, with the basement hatch door and several built ins installed as well

Flooring sanded and installed on the Braddock Street side

We continue our journey through the renovation process at the Samuel Noakes House at 101 West Cork Street/201 South Braddock Street. Updates are posted each Tuesday through the PHW blog, following the progress with virtual hardhat tours. The previous entries may be found at the PHW blog at part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12, part 13, part 14, part 15, part 16, part 17, and part 18.

This week at the Noakes house, we will catch up with some of the exterior progress, mainly on the Cork Street side. With the final shade of green chosen, the shutters were installed on the building. The majority of the work took place in the rear yard with the limestone retaining wall. The existing wall was carefully dismantled and rebuilt to accommodate the new drainage lines as well as a new access point to the yard on Cork Street. To reassemble the wall, the mason John Delre marked each piece of limestone so that it could be reinstalled correctly.

Subsequently, the rear yard was graded, but actual landscaping will wait until spring. At the former location of the Braddock Street porch stairs, a small pad for trash cans and a planter box have been installed. The Barbershop area received its exterior lighting and was festively lit for the holidays.

Join us next week as we survey some of the interior changes that have taken place since PHW toured the building during the Holiday House Tour.

Shutters are installed on Cork Street
Masonry work in the garden area
Grading the rear yard
Exterior lights installed at the Barbershop
The Noakes house dusted with snow

We continue our journey through the renovation process at the Samuel Noakes House at 101 West Cork Street/201 South Braddock Street. Updates are posted each Tuesday through the PHW blog, following the progress with virtual hardhat tours. The previous entries may be found at the PHW blog at part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12, part 13, part 14, part 15, part 16, and part 17.

Although it has been a while since we last visited the Noakes house and the building was open for in-person tours during the 2012 Holiday House Tour, our virtual tours of the building are not quite complete. We will jump backwards in time a bit to show some of the progress shortly before the Holiday House Tour. Before you saw the nearly finished product on December 8 and 9, drywall and built-in shelving went in to hide the insulation and mechanical systems. Electrical systems also were installed and made functional. While the changes have been less dramatic, the apartments are becoming two clearly defined, separate living areas.

During this time, more behind the scenes work took place with the Barbershop, including another trip to the Board of Architectural Review to discuss the door replacement and an inspection to provide fire separation between the commercial space and living space above. The bottoms of the structural timbers in the ceiling of the Barbershop will remain exposed between the drywall to preserve a historic feel. The BAR also approved the Braddock Street apartment and Barbershop door colors in Evening Sky blue, the same color as the Cork Street apartment. A small railing outside the Barbershop entrance was also approved, along with replacing the original Barbershop door with a replica retaining the mullion pattern of the existing door.

Interior walls and ceilings go up at Braddock Street
Electrical and lighting systems are installed
Cork Street steel railings and floor joists are painted
The built-ins take shape in the Braddock Street space