Burgman Building Restore: More Frescos and Landscape restoration continues

Well you know me, never satisfied. It kept bugging me that the ceiling in the Garland Parlor seemed too simple given the artistry on display elsewhere. The simple blue sky seemed well, just too simple, so off on another 'investigation.  In looking at the ceiling the paint seemed thicker in one corner and dental picks and blades in hand I began to carefully check the crackling that was evident in that area and well...as they say...here we go again.

As I suspected there was a top bordered wall design panels, It has a floral theme similar to the frieze. Still more conservation work to do, but it looks like I can get enough to create pattern that will allow me to replicate this detail. It appears they had a paint failure in the ceiling at some point, maybe a leak and the ceiling was scraped and the blue ceiling put on, for whatever reason , laziness perhaps, the painter didn't scrape one corner which  probably had firmly attached paint , or MAYBE they felt someday someone might come along to restore/recreate this feature?

So now we have another project.

Meantime outside we have been busy transplanting flowers and bused and starting the fence install around the area where the vegetable garden will be. We plan on replacing the brick edging with stone.

We also added a dry creek with a dry well under it because we are installing gutters on the carriage garage which will direct water away from the side wall of the garage.

Busy times around here.

An Anglo-Japanesque Aesthetic Movement Mantel Restoration

Regular readers of this blog may recall we obtained a high end one of a kind Anglo-Japanesque Aesthetic Movement Mantel. This mantel had suffered the indignities of being painted a dull gray which largely obscured its delicate designs.

Polychroming this mantel required some exploratory of the surface to determine some of the colors used, however you then have to adjust the colors which over 100 years have faded. The idea of course to reclaim the 'exuberance' of the Victorian Aesthetic Movement.

The background features a delicate fern leaf pattern with stylized flowers and medallions. One can but imagine the Parlor it came from..

In fact if you need a one of a kind mantle you can find it listed on our ebay  Auction.

But if you do not need a mantle, never fear, I am pleased to announce that we are releasing stencil design based on this mantle soon, so you can have a little Aesthetic Movement in your home.