Renovations from PoPville – A Fixer Upper in Park View episode two

Ed. Note: We used to feature these renovations from PoPville back in the day but it’s been a while since I’ve found folks willing to share. A good time for me to say, which I sadly realize I have to say, if you have negative comments about the reno please consider keeping it to yourself. Critiquing the renovations is not the point of these posts. It’s simply to show what some folks have done. If you like it, obviously, feel free to let them know but again – well let me be clear – don’t be a jerk. Thanks. Sorry to have to preface with that. I really do love these features and am fortunate that 2 or 3 three more folks have also agreed to share their renovations. These renovations can be extensive – like a whole house gut or simply a 1/2 bath added, floor refinished or even smaller. It can be a whole series of posts or just one. If you’d like to share one of your projects please email princeofpetworth(at)gmail thanks and thanks for understanding!

You can read episode one from this series here.

We did a lot of little things in the house as soon as we moved in. Obviously it’s wise to change the locks, which we did after settlement. The door knobs and locks on it were pretty worn though so it was a nice aesthetic change as well. The house address was also a junky piece of wood with paint chipping and the numbers were not pretty either. That was any easy update because we just bought the numbers at Home Depot and removed the piece of wood from the house. It was somewhat difficult to mount the numbers against the brick, but I just aligned them so I could screw it in to the mortar.

One thing we thought that we would do was strip the paint on some of the doors and frames. Well, my partner started stripping one of the entryways and it was a lot more difficult than she imagined. We decided we would only do that one since it was a very time-consuming. There were multiple layers of paint and we wanted to even it out as much as we could, but we could have worked on it all year.

The bathroom light fixture was horrendous. Well, the whole bathroom is horrendous, but a light fixture is a lot easier, and cheaper to fix. Again we bought a simple light fixture at Home Depot and my partner installed it. I cannot do electrical so I am glad she can! The foyer had an old, flat light that looked kind of gross inside. We ordered a little chandelier on Wayfair.com. Now that was a lot more difficult to install, but it was worth it in the end!

before

Lastly, we removed all the closet doors and in some cases the closet completely. The closet in the master bedroom had those sliding doors and I hate those because they always come off the tracks! My partner removed those and we actually used one of the closet doors to make a coat rack for the foyer. Anyhow, then we bought closet organizers from Home Depot (yes we spend a lot of time and money there). We installed that one evening and it wasn’t too difficult. We will put doors back on the closet eventually, but I just try to keep my closet organized for now! There were also mirror closets in the back room of the house and the room in the basement. We removed the doors and shelves in the back office so right now it’s just a nook. Not sure if we’re going to keep it like that or what because we haven’t finished that room. My partner removed the closet in the basement, but kept the shelves because we turned that room into a home gym. If anyone is interested in doing that we bought some weights, bar, and bench on Craigslist for about $75! All these little updates are much more affordable than many of our other projects, but they make a difference.

after