The Project Begins

On November 11, 2012, Brad and I bought this Italianate-style home on historic Somonauk Street in Sycamore, Illinois.  This house was built in 1866 by Dr. Orlando M. Bryan, who was Sycamore's first doctor. As you will see from the sketch below, many of the original features of the home, such as the cupola and porch, are now missing.

 

We bought this house on Auction.com without ever having set foot inside.  

When we finally did go in, we found the first floor had been divided in to two apartments with a shared kitchen.

1st floor - south apartment 

Closet built to cover original hallway

1st floor - north apartment 

1st floor - north apartment (reverse)

North apartment bedroom during demo

North apartment bathroom during demo

1st floor common area

1st floor shared kitchen - southwest side

Staircase divided 1st floor apartments

The second floor was divided in half, again in to two apartments.  

Upstairs landing

2nd floor - south apartment

2nd floor - south apartment (reverse) 

South apartment bedroom

South apartment bathroom

North apartment bedroom

North apartment kitchen

North apartment 2nd bedroom

North apartment bathroom

The first task was dismantling the apartments.  There were some nice original features hiding under layers of paint, the drop ceiling and the carpet.

A demo crew was hired to come in and remove all the lath, plaster, drop ceiling tiles, dry wall, wiring, and insulation. 

We then went in and finished the demo.  With some help from Matt, Kurt, Luke, and Jake, we cleaned up the remaining insulation, removed sanitary and plumbing lines; ducting, and non-load bearing walls. 

After cleaning 150 years of dirt in the attic

Uncovering original hallway

Original hallway uncovered 

1st floor - south apartment fireplace

1st floor - south apartment with uncovered fireplace

Former south apartment and shared kitchen

former north apartment

former north apartment

1st floor north - former bedroom & bathroom 

former common area and north bedroom

Former kitchen

Upstairs landing

Entire 2nd floor north apartment

Entire 2nd floor south apartment

Once the plaster and ceiling tiles were removed, we found a bit of a mess!  Over the years, almost every floor joist had been compromised in one way or another.  Countless support beams (both horizontal and vertical) had been irresponsibly cut. Here are two good examples….

Over time, the floors all sagged in the middle and were very springy.  What this meant for us was all other development got put on hold and our focus turned towards the basement.  After consulting a Structural Engineer, Ted Carlson at Structural Dynamics, we decided we needed to strengthen our house before we did anything else.  This meant cutting out patches of the concrete basement floor, digging out bucket after bucket of dirt, and then refilling the patches with new concrete.  By doing this, we made deeper (and stronger) pads on which our newly ordered steel (that’s right, steel) beams now sit. 

These vertical post hold up the new horizontal beams.  As I mentioned above, each existing wood joist (the beams running along the ceiling of the basement, which support the first floor) were compromised in some way… a notch cut out here for conduit, a cut there for ducting, etc.  Not to jump ahead of myself, but this was true for the entire house! That meant that each joist on each floor needed to be “sistered” up with a new wood joist.  This blew Brad’s lumber budget to shreds. 

I digress back to the basement.  It all sounds straight forward, but it has really been quite an undertaking.  First, cutting out the concrete was not easy and carrying out the buckets of dirt was no fun.  Then we called all hands on deck (thanks to Mike, Jim, Matt, Paul, Joe, Kevin, Kevin, and Tony) to help when the Regional Concrete truck arrived.  Wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow was filled, transported, and emptied until each new pad was filled, leveled, and finished. 

Next was the temporary placing of the steel beams and posts.  With a lot of help from our friends Chris and Kevin, the steel beams were hoisted up in to the wall pockets and temporary wood beams were jacked up underneath to hold their weight.  

There was a lot of “troubleshooting” for lack of a better word.  The object was to get the first floor level. The problem was, the first floor had not been level in 150 years.  After a couple challenges, the former dining room floor was completely removed and the rest of the first floor was as level as it was ever going to be.

The steel posts were ordered and then put in place of the temporary wood posts and jacks.  

One more beam needed to go in before the posts could be welded to their corresponding beams.  This was a 500 pound, 18 foot long beam on the first floor.  Its purpose was to hold the weight of the second floor on the northwest side.  The post supporting this beam would run all the way up from the basement to the beam on the first floor ceiling…that’s a 16 foot long post!

Again, all hands on deck for the raising of the ginormous first floor beam. 

Then, it was time for our welder, Carl.  He welded the vertical support posts to the horizontal beams. 

And that is where we are at now.  If you were to walk in to our “home,” you would think we had not made any progress at all.  We've done a lot of “invisible” work.  However, this work insures that our house will stand for another 150 years.

Next up framing….