Tuesday, September 23, 2014

PROJECT GUESTHOUSE

  Needless to say, we have spent a lot of time at our summer cabin in the past few months. Mostly it is about fun and play, but we have also been productive.
 We have been restoring and building a guesthouse there. Since the cabin is located on an island where you can only get to and from by your own boat, our guests often stay overnight. So there is big demand for an updated, quality, up-to-date lodging.

  Here´s what we´ve done (so far) this summer:

The starting point. An old tool shed from the sixties. We wanted to conserve the old, instead of demolishing it and building a completely new one, out of respect for the history of the place.
Emptying it was a huge task in itself! Under the floor boards there were old bird nests and 35 abandoned, rotten, eggs...

Only one window in the whole building.
Don´t they say it always has to get worse before it can get better?

Roof under construction, plus bits here and there too.
Floors, walls, the roof, everything was strengthened and rotten wood replaced with new. And the whole building lifted up higher a foot.

Then it was time to start rebuilding. Now light begun to show at the end of the tunnel.
Now the inside feels fresh and good to breathe in.

And after installing more and bigger windows, the space seemed to triple.

Some of the old boards and beams are still visible, but not much is left of the old shag.

The outside begins to form.

Especially after getting painted.

We wanted it to match the new shed-outhouse we finished earlier this year. (Needless to say, the buildings are not crooked in reality, the camera lens is to blame here!)

This is what awaits for us next: insulation. And it is about time, the temperature has dropped to near freezing in the past couple of days!

  The style of these buildings I drew from old fishing sheds, which I imagine having stood by the sea for a hundred years. Something like this.

  Project guesthouse will continue until the sea freezes around the island. And then we´ll see what the winter will be like, whether or not we´ll be able to drive there by car.
  Projects keep life interesting. Highly recommendable I say!


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