Does anyone know what you’d find under the siding of a frame house? Why are they all covered in siding, and is it ever possible to rehabilitate the outside to some former glory??


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  1. Thank you so much, Slopefarm, for all these juicy details. Especially that window casings tidbit.

    What do you (or anyone else) think about trying to restore all the gingerbread we had originally? Good idea, bad idea, not necessary, will be a mishmash fake old new if we don’t?

    Off to buy a lottery ticket…

  2. Oh, and mopar — this was part of our enormous job, so architect was on board. Not sure if necessary just for this part of the job. We ended up rebuilding the framing from scratch. So we have wood framing with blocking, sheetrock on the inside, insulation (if you are semiattached, up the R value a bit), an exterior-grade plywood layer covered with tyvek, and planks, window casings and trim on the outside of that. Use a contractor that specializes in this stuff. T&A is a bit pricey but they are pros and stand behind their work, including vendor errors. You want the cornice and roof tied in correctly. Window casings are just just flat wood with an extra molding around the edges. Again, walk those blocks and decide what elements you like.

  3. GWG — we didn’t live in it before doing the work, so I wouldn’t know about movement. We bit off the whole enormous project at the beginning as the place was uninhabitable when we closed. I do know the walls were effin’ cold when it was cold out. And the house’s bones rattled like crazy during the heavy duty work.

    mopar — we did hardiplank siding (the stuff dibs raves about). Most of the frames with new clapboards are using this stuff. Far more durable and fire safe than wood and holds paint much better, and looks real once painted. Do a nice job with the window casings, cornice and other trim, get a nice wood door, maybe throw in a few rows of fishscale below the cornice, and you get the historic-lite look that everyone is doing (including yours truly). Use the SMOOTH side of the hardiplank, not the grainy side — the grainy stuff looks fake, the smooth looks like wood once painted. I highly recommend a stroll around 11th Street between 3rd and 4th aves and Windsor Place between 7th and 8th aves, to get ideas on how the plansk and trim should look.

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