when we bought it
after re-cladding
this week
we're re-piering and have raised it just under a metre from the ground. doesn't sound like much, until you add the height of the house and suddenly it looks quite strange. the base of the kitchen door has gone from one step above ground level to the top of our recycling bin. the new height has certainly added a lift to the street and to our little cottage. it's been stopping traffic as people check it out.
built in 1926, probably as a fisherman's cottage, the original building was one room. since then the living room and verandah have been added, later again, the kitchen and dining room were added. the roof, which originally would have run north/south blew off in a big storm in the 1980's and it's had a funny flat roof ever since.
the main bedroom is what would have been the original house, you can tell by the lovely old floor boards and the front door with the bell on it. you can also tell by the position of the old steps on the north side of the building. the room faces north and i think our house was one of the first to be built in the street, the boy's window is really big and faces due north, which once would have had a beautiful view to the bay, now the room with a view, as i love to refer to it, has a great north facing view to our neighbour's wall. as time has gone on and land has been subdivided, our house has shifted it's frontage west to address the street.
when we bought it we took off plastic cladding and discovered old weatherboard cladding below. charlie had the profile of the cladding copied and we've re-clad the house in the wide weatherboard. we also discovered old doors with coloured glass in them that had been wallpapered shut and we uncovered the closed in verandah to discover the lovely old wooden posts.
we'll be adding a new bedroom and a back deck to the house in the next few weeks. we'll also be reinstating the front door to its original position. more face lifts for an old shack. i'll keep you posted.
Hello and welcome to the blogging world! I am another local-ish blogger. It was sad to see your cafe go - we often drove past on-route to Pearl Beach and always said we would stop. You know the time we did, you were no longer there! So we kept on driving. Good luck with your blogging adventures and I look forward to reading more (I came to you here via Hazy Jane).
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Rachael