Recommendation for Paint Stripping, Shutter Restoration and/or Lead Abatement

If you are looking into stripping and/or restoring your historic woodwork, you should seriously consider hiring Gerald LaStarza, of Brooklyn Modern.  (info@brooklynartisan.com; brooklynmodern.com) After our kid tested with slightly elevated blood lead levels, we knew we had to get our shutters, moldings, and front door stripped and stained or repainted.  We needed to make sure the work was done so as to minimize and contain any lead paint disruption, but given the cost we also needed to make sure the results would look great.  I found Gerald after looking through very mixed reviews of some of the more well-known paint stripping companies, which all told me we’d need to leave the house for 6 weeks in order to do the project safely.  Over the course of several months during which we decided what we wanted to do, how to do it safely, and confirmed a budget, Gerald walked us through our options, gave us authoritative input on what would look the best, responded to all of our questions, and worked with us to enable us to do the project right and on the timeline we needed.  The final scope of work consisted of restoring a door and shutters and historic casements (for 7 windows) that could be removed and stripped offsite, while replicating panels, stops and sills that had degraded too much and couldn’t be stripped offsite as easily.  We repainted everything except the door and shutters, which we took back to a dark brown with a gel stain to cover lots of dings and repairs.  We left the house for 2 weeks while everything was taken offsite, stripped, primed or sealed and reinstalled, and the house cleaned.  All work was done to EPA standards.  The finish work and punch list took a long time – about six weeks – but that included a few change orders.     The final product looks really amazing – particularly our shutters and door, which now all function and look lovely – and Gerald worked tirelessly and creatively with our budget and time constraints (kids naptimes, etc.).  He likes to help his clients even when the problems are far out of scope; he even shop vac’ed out our cellar when Irene wasn’t very kind to us!  He’s very responsive by email and on cell, and is great at sending photos so you know exactly what’s going on and can understand your choices.  He’s also just a really nice person.  The only demerit I had to give on the project is that Gerald’s team could have been a little more careful in both their prep and finish work to avoid collateral damage to the floor and walls that seemed unnecessary- this was a bummer after the rest of the work turned out so nicely, and led to a longer punchlist than we had expected.  Still, I highly recommend Gerald and would be happy to answer any questions about his work or the lead abatement stuff in general.  (Note: Gerald also does custom cabinetry, but it is much cooler than what we needed or could afford to do, so I can’t speak to that.  But Gerald is definitely an artist and we took great comfort in his understanding that we wanted to respect the modest nature the woodwork we had but also elevate it to a cleaner and better place!)

So, did he provide you with a legitimate lead abatement, or did he strip for restoration purposes following RRP regulations? Was there any stripping at all done on location? I’m not clear why you needed to leave the house?