Do it the right way the first time and you save money in the long term. Right?
Here’s the thing with that philosophy : You may not know the the “right way” at the “right time.” And that’s normal, expensive. frustrating, and TOTALLY OKAY. If this has happened to you, you aren’t alone.
When we had the porch rebuilt in 2014, the steps were GLORIOUS. I mean, BEAUTIFUL.
What we didn’t know – and we weren’t knowledgeable enough about restoration at the time – is that our crew we hired didn’t seal the underside of the tread wood before installing. CUE THE DESTRUCTION. You can see in this next picture the places where Doug has done some patching. We’ve done this each year for a few years. Basically Band-Aids, but the generic ones that don’t really stick after 3 minutes.
Honestly, the porch floor needs to be redone as well, but since that is mostly under cover, it’s not an immediate need.
This is the worst of the porch. The rest has some weird spots, but it’ll last a bit.
Since the steps are always in the elements, it got pretty bad.
And by pretty bad, I mean “OH YES THERE WERE ALSO TERMITES.”
Here’s the posts before we took them out.
Cool. COOL COOL.
I keep reminding myself that we got through 10 years, and that’s a decent amount of time!
This year we were going to be on the home tour in September. And I was just imagining someone needing the hand rails, and grabbing onto this :
And this :
And THIS ISN’T EVEN CONNECTED TO THE POST :
Sometimes my friends, “Light and Airy” is a bad, bad, bad thing.
So, if you’re keeping track? There was a home tour coming up, and we were the best example of a hazard!
Things that are Destroyed :
- The Stairs
- The Handrails
- The Newel Posts
Things we can Salvage :
- The Newel Posts (not for the front steps – but we can chop off the rot, reseal, and use them for SOMETHING in the backyard)
- The Spindles
These are totally fine!
What should we do with these? Tell me your ideas! We do have a shed in the back yard that matches the house, in case that is helpful!
I was going to do the first part of this post in one go, but really, it’s almost Halloween so just making this a Horror Post seems legit. I’ll go to the new construction next time!
But to leave you on a “looking backwards to look forward” post, I will tell you that we went back and forth. And Back. And Forth. AND BACK. AND FORTH. on what to replace the steps with that wouldn’t put us in this position again, but that also honored the house.
We didn’t see old exterior picture of the house, until AFTER we did the steps the first time. But, now that we have them, we used them for some reference.
Our house is on the left with the brick foundation and the peak on the porch roof. The steps clearly look to be concrete.
Here’s a picture from the 1950s, and you can see them better here. I ASSUME that these are the original steps.
In the 1960s/70s, the whole porch came off (I assume it rotted, and as a rental, wasn’t worth replacing). SHE LOOKS SO SAD. Also sad is that little lamp in the window, just looking for a way out.
Then in the mid 80s, when the porch was put back on by the Beidlers, they added wooden steps, and the rounded front of the porch, which definitely changes the shape of what you can do with the steps. We LOVE the round, but it does pose some challenges.
So, we need :
- Durability
- Honor the Original Steps
- Still have Handrails for Safety
- Still have color, because ME
I’ll show you what we do next time!
Cement. They can make it look like wood, any color. For the wood….how ’bout Rhino Shield??? Just a thought……
Oh, what we chose to do is already done – it was just going to be too long of a blog post! You’ll see it next post! ❤️
is there any chance the concrete steps are still there, under the curve?
Nope! The original steps were removed when the pitch was taken off in the 60s. In the blog post, the steps in the picture without the pitch are not the original. In fact, the brick foundation from the original porch was used as fill for those 1970s steps, and those bricks were reused when the porch was put back on in the 1980s.
Can’t wait to see the new porch! Here are some ideas for the newel posts:
1. Use them as fence posts set maybe 4′ off the corners of the side of the shed that has a door. Add whatever fancy Victorian fence-like items match to connect the posts and the shed. This would give the shed a bit more “presence.”
2. If your shed has a window, use them as supports for a window box.
3. Remove a wedge from each and tack them onto the shed corners on the side that has a door. They could mimic the fancy wooden corner “bumpers” that Victorian houses often have.
4. Build a bench with the posts as the back legs.
What material did you use to build the handrail and knewl post the first go round
All exterior pressure treated wood. Termites can still get through, which was most of the issue.