Bird Blog: Week 22

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Every other week, Jennifer Mankins, owner of the Bird boutiques, tells us about the new 2,500-square-foot store on Grand Street in Williamsburg that she’s getting ready to open. Up this week: Down to the wire, with only two weeks left before she goes live.

Two weeks and counting until I open the Grand Street side of the store for the holiday pop-up shop. I have ordered 7000 postcards announcing the December opening, I am set to install the holiday decorations by the artist Tamar Mogendorff after Thanksgiving and my retail computers are scheduled to be installed on December 1st. There is so much left to do, but Bill has about 4 different crews working round the clock to close up the front, so it may just happen.

The wood: Finally the reclaimed, milled pinewood planks have been delivered and are being installed on the walls. I love the sappy warm color, the grain pattern and mostly, the fresh pine smell. The whole store smells like Christmas. The planks were milled from industrial beams that were salvaged from a warehouse here in Brooklyn dating back to the turn of the century.

Exterior Grand Street: The storefront glass is installed. All of the sidewalk metal has been painted and the sidewalk glass panels sandblasted and installed as well as the tile on the bottom of the storefront. I had no idea the sandblasted glass would match the tile so well. I love it. All of the electrical wires for the door and the alarm system and cameras have been pulled. The last major thing we’re waiting for is the new door. It was delivered last night and they’re installing it tomorrow.

Exterior North 1st street: The wood framing for the top and bottom platform of the storefront has been installed and all of the metal framing for the glass has been delivered. It is now easy to see what the new shape of the storefront will be. It is going to be stunning.

Interior floors: The wood floors have been sanded, stained, and sealed with a low voc grey water-based stain. The color variation is really interesting and looks amazing, especially with the wood walls. They look like really old teak wood that has been worn to perfection. All the concrete in the north side and bathroom floor has been patched and sanded and will get sealed once they finish the mammoth job of drywalling the ceiling.

Basement: We are prepping the basement so the front half of the floor can be repoured to be sloped toward the drain in the floor. Right now all the water pools about 2 feet left of the drain, which doesn’t do us any good. We were also getting a lot of moisture on the western wall every time it rained. Bill discovered a lack of flashing between our building and our neighbors building, which he promptly fixed. I love working with smart people! The shower plumbing has been installed and our inspection was passed. We have decided to use the remaining cedar wood from the original sauna as wainscoting and benches in the shower/locker room. The stonewalls have been cleaned and new electrical as well as network cables have been run from upstairs. They moved a water pipe that originally ran through the glass sidewalk panels so now those can be better sealed.

Cash/wrap: The concrete slab counter has been poured and is set. It took them a whole day to pour it and they left the frame on for a week. No cracks yet! Bill explained that it is actually better to not have any rebar in the concrete, because it is the tension of the concrete adhering to the metal that causes cracking, especially on tight corners like we have around the computer wells. The top still needs to be polished and sealed, but we are leaving all the little air bubbles on the edges.

Fabric: So it turns out that Deadly Squire doesn’t have enough fabric after all for the curtains. They have bits and pieces here and there, so maybe enough to make cushions for the dressing room benches. For the main curtain I was thinking about going the Josef Frank route again as it is a central design element in all of my stores. But it is just so freaking expensive, and in this economy I am trying to watch every penny I am spending. So when yesterday I found the most amazing Transylvanian hemp/cotton curtains at Moon River Chattel that are the right size and already sewn for around $300 a pair I snapped them up. And now it looks like the dressing room doors are not going to be ready for the pop-up shop, which means I also need fabric for curtains there at least temporarily.

HVAC: All the ductwork has been installed and we are just waiting for the registers. The sweep and return air duct are kind of crazy looking, and bigger than I imagined, but much better than what we had before. The metal is really shiny, so we are going to wash it with vinegar, which will tone it down make it age a bit more quickly. They have fired up the unit twice, and twice it has kicked in and then shut off, so they are coming back today to service it and try to get it to stay on. It is one thing to have temporary fixtures, tables, curtains or lights for the pop-up shop, but heat isn’t really negotiable.

LEED: I signed the contract for the energy commissioning and we are meeting for our first NYSERDA walk through next week. This week we also submitted our application for design review with the U.S. Green Building Council. The results should come back in about a month. I signed up for a two-year contract for wind-only power through Community Energy for a fixed rate of 17.2 cents/KWH which is a little pricey, but not too bad and have bulk ordered non-toxic cleaning supplies from a great company called EcoLogic.