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If I may, I’d like to explain my position on the salvage of old homes and barns.
I feel that if there is a chance that an old home will be restored and cared for that it should be left alone and respected. I have turned down the salvage opportunity on many such properties over the years. Some of those buildings still stand today in disrepair, some were salvaged by others, some were lost, but a few have been restored.
If however a vintage structure will soon be lost forever, or there is a danger of it injuring visitors, then I feel salvaging is a worthy and honorable thing to do. Salvaging is nothing new, there are whole villages in England that were built centuries before America was founded that were built out of salvaged materials from even earlier buildings. I have worked on log cabins built in the 1800’s that had logs in them from previous cabins built in the 1700’s.
My goal has always been to try and rebuild the home back somewhere else as close to the original as it can be. Most of the time this is not an option. The majority of structures that I have salvaged are either in a great state of disrepair, or other people have been in the home before I have arrived, and have already removed materials such as: the doors, the mantles, and even the flooring.
If putting a home back up as it was was is not an option. I will use each piece as it was intended… I install antique flooring back down as flooring… I don’t run it through a planer and make furniture out of it. I put beams back up as beams; I don’t saw them up to make flooring. I also do my best to document and photograph each home and pass this information on to the homeowners to keep the story of their new home intact.
Years ago I ended up with several homes that needed to be salvaged that coming summer. I came up with what I thought was a great idea. I would offer four paid summer positions to historic architectural students. They could join in on my team in salvaging these homes; and in the process gain some hands-on experience with the type of structures they were learning about in school, and also help me better document these pieces of history.
So, I called up the head of the local university’s historic architectural department (I live near Charlottesville Va), explained who I was, what I did, and what I’d like to do. She informed me that she felt that I was as low of a life form as could exist, and that she would do everything that she could “to protect her students” from me, and that she would rather see an old house burned down than come into the hands of someone like me.
I obviously abandoned my idea after that call… it was a shame, I really think there would have been plenty of benefits to all.
I later spoke with someone in her department who listened to all I had to say and at the end she said that I was rather convincing but that she felt that she had just had an encounter with the devil himself and wondered if she needed to take a shower.
Is there any wonder that builders have struggles with architects?

Originally posted 2015-03-01 21:02:53.