Lipstick, Body Scrubs and Skin Grafts

By KEITH LIGGETT

Off to the south, a lot of conversations these days revolve around putting lipstick on pit bulls and pigs. The point being, a dash of color will not change the nature of the beast.
The same can be said for houses. A dash of color will not change the beast.

On the other hand, real work on the finish—what we see on the outside and inside—will substantially change the beast.

The finish of a house, the final layer, sets a tone and a value that carries far beyond simple colors. The finish—wood, drywall, plaster—on the inside will directly infuse a level comfort to a home. Think of the difference between walking in a house that is raw studs, then one with insulation and a vapor barrier and last, one with the final dry wall. A continuum of comfort is experienced. The first is a cave. The second is not all that different from the final product—a half-inch of processed rock—but it now holds stillness. Dry wall finishes off the interior and allows some “lipstick” as a final touch. But the drywall is actually a part of the interior finish, not just another layer.

A few years ago, I built in a community maintaining long-term quality as core values. In the three years I built there, I never dry walled a house. The standard interior finish was plaster—either one skim coat on blue board or more often three full layers with a final color coat. The alternative to plaster most often chosen was wood paneling. For special rooms, the invariable style was raised panel (like old style doors). Needless to say, this was tremendously labor intensive.

The interesting aspect of this community choice centered around the price. The plasterers we used were third generation Italian craftsmen. Well into his 70’s, the grandfather still worked occasionally when the crunch was on. The kids mixed and carried mud. The fathers applied. The oldest of them working on the final coat as the rest moved ahead of finish through the house. And the price of this vast crew assembling and rolling through the house? More than conventional drywall, but factoring in the savings in other areas, the actual cost increase was not that substantial. Why? There were savings before the plaster in how we framed. There were savings after the plaster in not having to paint the interior or the exterior (the final coat carried the color). When it all figured in, yes it was more expensive, but the value—perceived and actual return on the dollar—made the client decision a slam-dunk.

All finish work decisions should be so simple.

In trimming out a window, the decisions are many. Picture frame? The simple four pieces of trim casing the window with 45-degree miters at the corners. Or first installing a windowsill with an apron below and the casing above? Should you add a piece of detail across the top? The options are as many as the windows.

The choice seems simple. What will the cost be? But while cost is a factor, there is the intangible factor of living with the finish after the installation.

Recently a friend reached the finish part of his re-model. A lived in re-model, he’d been looking at windows set in walls with bits of pink insulation sticking out for a couple years. Bathrooms, kitchens, walls and stairs rose to a more immediate importance than the trim around the windows. And when it came to that, he thought and looked hard. Then he made the difficult choice. Windowsill, apron, detail on the top, all out of fir. Picking up raw wood, he custom milled each piece. He stained and put one coat of finish on each piece before starting the installation.

The actual trim project didn’t take that long. A few weeks with a finish carpenter and helper (homeowner). Today, you don’t even see the trim. It blends so completely into the room, that the view out the window takes the first look. Then as you stand close to the window, you notice the wood surround. The joints are all clean. The reveal (how much of the layer below shows) is always even. The finish is dark, subtle and consistent throughout.

The best trim you don’t notice until you realize you are not noticing it.

Where I sit in my living room writing this, I see the opposite. The three windows are all cased in a different style. There is a door to the front porch, to a bedroom and to the kitchen. All are different. The front door and bedroom door are similar, with a traditional clamshell, but the kitchen casing is square edged dimensional material.

The house is a rental.

When I moved in the rooms were all painted dark colors. I joke it was previously occupied by a tribe of night-working snowboarders. Even the floors were painted a dark chocolate brown. What could I do that would make it more livable without much effort? And cost? I made some simple choices.

Paint was one answer. The lipstick. I painted rooms. Lighter colors. Even lighter trim.
Then I stripped the carpet from the bedroom. Whew. That immediately removed the musty snowboard cave smell. Under the dirty dusty carpet were issues of the Free Press from the early 1950’s. I should have saved a few, but I was so disgusted with the mess, I tossed the whole deal.

Then I rented a floor sander from Fernie Rentals and went to town. The living room floor took untold sheets of 38 grit sandpaper, only slightly rougher than the asphalt just laid on Highway 3. Then I worked my way down through the grits to 280. A buff with a hand sander and four coats of urethane. The first couple of finish coats were sucked up like water in paper towels the wood was so dry.

The result is a livable comfortable couple of rooms. Light in feeling, there are little glitches, but it is an old house. Glitches are part of the character. The lived in old shoe comfortable feeling of an old house.

The cost was about $700. It seems like a lot at first, but when you spread it over a year or two, it becomes negligible. Over my two years, that’s $30 a month. Cheap for comfort day in and day out. Sort of a two room body scrub and exfoliation.

So when you look at a house, look to the finish. It reflects how the house will live and how it was built. If the finish seems seamless, it’s a comfort. If bits and pieces stick out, look at the bits and figure out how to take the edges off. Think of more than lipstick on a pig, but less than a full skin graft. Smoothing the edges will make every day a little more comfortable.