Chinking is the stuff you put between the logs to keep the weather out. That’s why we like to build an insulated sandwich in the spaces to insure against a Canadian winter barging uninvited into our livingroom and making itself at home. The ideal space to work with is about three inches of height by [...]
For fifty years so far, I have loved old log houses, particularly the hand-hewn square-timbered ones that I find superior to all other styles. I love restoring these log houses for families who also appreciated them. And I’ll go anywhere to find a vintage log house. They seemed easy to find back in the 60s [...]
Sometimes in our business we run into creatures big and small. One or another of them seemed to think these old abandoned houses would make a lovely home and why not? They weren’t being used were they? We’d often start with the dirty business of cleaning up after them since their natural tendencies precluded our [...]
Someone advised me to see an elderly lady in the hospital in Lindsey, I forget just who now. All I was told was that she was very interested in history and antiques and wanted to share something with me. I did go to see her and I’m glad I did. She was supposedly gravely ill [...]
It was not quite as seldom as I liked that I was met with what I came to call the His/Her conundrum. Some men love a log house. Some women love a log house. Sometimes they both love a log house…but not often enough for me. Needless to say, I get few calls from those [...]
Fifty years in the restoration or reproduction of period houses often offers unexpected challenges. Dr. Morley for instance, was particular about having a period style house, so particular that we drove over most of southern Ontario picking out what we agreed were the nicest, while pertinent features of mid-century stone houses. Leaving out the bric-a-brac [...]
I built my first green home 46 years ago. But I didn’t know it was a green home. It was a house of wood and stone mostly, and wood that had been around for a couple of hundred years or so (I never bothered to count the rings). The stone, precambrian granite…well, I think it was [...]
The true Shaker kitchen was spotless, ready for hungry workers at 5:30 a.m., and doubtless the epitome of efficiency and craftsmanship among other things. Mine is not. Quite. Yet. It’s true I took inspiration from the many aspects I have always admired about the Shaker ethic. I have always found their neat, unadorned spaces with their [...]
I just love things old. Houses, furniture, things with history, beauty, character and that patina that comes with the bestowal of nature’s slow grace. It was this love that led me, long ago, to a simple cottage in the woods that seemed to have the potential for something beautiful to be created. A clear stream meandering [...]