Cast Iron Fence: We Can Rebuild It
Here’s a fun guest post from a Clinton Hill brownstone owner… The story: Our 130-year old iron fence was in terrible shape, barely standing at all—the last of the five identical houses in our row to have even pieces of the original. I had Vinnie from Italian Art Iron Works on Bergen Street out to…
Here’s a fun guest post from a Clinton Hill brownstone owner…
The story: Our 130-year old iron fence was in terrible shape, barely standing at all—the last of the five identical houses in our row to have even pieces of the original. I had Vinnie from Italian Art Iron Works on Bergen Street out to look at it, and was still skeptical that it could be saved. It was missing 17 arrows and five of the seven post-end caps. Fortunately, previous owners saved 16 arrows, so at least we had those. Vinnie says to me, “You gotta spend-a the money.” So I did. Here’s a photo of Vinnie’s guy putting the pieces together along with one of what it looks like now. But that spikey finial you see below was one of only two that we had. I scoured the salvage places, emailed photos to Olde Good Things and all the rest—nada. Vinnie ballparked that it could cost us $4,000 to have new ones cast—yikes!
And then…
…my architect found these guys: Tomahawk Foundry in Rice Lake, Wisconsin, of all places. I sent them a picture and described what I needed. They said they’d do it for $150 apiece. I sent them one of the remaining finials. Three weeks later, they sent me the parts—gray iron, cast in sand. Original on the left, replica on the right. Perfect.
So if you’re looking to bring your iron fence back to life and can’t find all the pieces, there ya go. Fence should be complete again within a couple of weeks. And Bob’s yer uncle.
Of all the Asian accents, I like Thai the best, which is very similar to Vietnamese, Laotian & Cambodian. Singaporian accents and “Singlish” in particular is very annoying. Malaysian accednts are less annoying but similar and without the ‘tude. Mainland Chinese accents are rather nice but Cantonese are harsh sounding and that makes them interesting in their own way. There is nothing sexier than an Asian with a Brooklyn accent, except one with an Aussie accent.
crescent hill and lalena – Andate tutti a ‘fanculo!
(I am Italian. and you, you are patently ridiculous)
Again, if one can no longer make any sort of comment about any distinguishing feature of another human being we are living in a sad world. Posted by: wasder at September 16, 2009 1:57 PM
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I agree – but I am still waiting to hear some other accents portrayed/mocked here. Vinnie seemed to be an easy target, but then again, he is likely a “character” who is “old world” and “old fashioned”, right?
Exactly my point crescent. Thanks for illustrating how silly and not worth arguing about this is. Again, if one can no longer make any sort of comment about any distinguishing feature of another human being we are living in a sad world. That being said, I do understand that many people have a different sense for the “line” in these sorts of instances.
What’s goin on here? Rehab, thanks for the recommendation. You’ra nice-a man. DIBS too.
Crescent, you sounda like-a my pinko son-in-law.
Im-a glad you spent-a the money. Looks-a great. I need-a to fix-a lots of things on my exterior (fence and cornice especially) so this is a kick in the pants-a for me.
Posted by: wasder at September 16, 2009 10:58 AM
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Silly line of conversation…you should know.
Oy vey (I just to throw another ethnicity into the mix)!
The fence looks fantastic. I love that you choose to rehab rather than replace it.
My fence is in need of some TLC and I’ve found this to be a great resource as well:
http://www.architecturaliron.com/gallery/fgrw.htm
Great job.
yes, please don’t discuss racial insensitivity and crude, inappropriate rants. As long as my house looks good, all is well. And please don’t spill your latte on my perego!
Can we give this a rest now? Bxgrl has not been exposed to be anything but a reasonable person. This is such a silly line of conversation and a complete detour from the topic at hand.