7. Conundrums seem to always spark creative ideas, don’t you think?

We and many of our guests are always intrigued by the fabulous ghost images of the wallpaper peeking through paint due to our approach to keeping the plaster intact. We also love that we left the radiators in all the rooms as benches, historical art and whimsy. And, of course the door-to-nowhere makes everyone smile.

In the Art section, we share more details of the process involved in painting a faux rug on the floor in the upstairs front bedroom, all because the middle of the floor had been painted brown.

The brick on the interior short wall around the front porch was covered with a form of stucco and painted red for some reason. Another stenciling project is in process and has fooled a few people into thinking that bricks line the interior of the porch. Trompe l’oiel is a favorite technique that is coming in handy for us. We have many ideas for such techniques as we face conundrums and will share them in future blog posts.

The step from the sidewalk to the street had crumbled and was really deep. There was a pile of leftover brick pavers near the back door that we believe may have been used there. Although involved and a bit time-consuming, we are happy to reveal a good safe step there now.

There were all kinds of little hooks surrounding the front porch. We believe awnings may have been used at one time. But, we found the hooks are perfect for securing lights!

We still haven’t figured out the fireplaces. One is tiny and probably used coal. It is sealed with paper, we think. The other is large with very old gas logs. We checked, but decided to wait on that. Let us know if you have any ideas.

The studio is clearly the best room in the house. It even has parquet flooring. Some say that is out of date, but it really is quite lovely. Can you imagine a studio with lovely floors? We can’t either and so because of our penchant for cardboard, we made our own protective rugs using duct tape to keep the frayed cardboard pieces at a minimum and to protect the floor from messy paint!