Thanksgiving and Steel

So far the construction work has only involved taking things down and removing them - but today is the first time we actually built something. Now that we have our party wall agreement we can finally start work. Big step!

Today our primary steel beam was delivered and installed. They don't celebrate Thanksgiving here (obviously), so everyone was working.

Nov 25th - The fabricated steel delivery

This beam is the main framing element for the 2nd floor (loft level) and is what allows us to remove the original wooden structural wall that supports the roof truss (that carries the weight of the roof). This is critical to our design, because the old structural wall was in the way - to make everything fit in our new layout, we needed an additional 18". Without the 18" it simply would not work.

The process of ordering a steel beam involves hiring a fabricator who will purchase the raw steel, cut it down to size, and then makes any splices or holes needed for installtion. The beam sizing and design came from our structural engineer and in co-ordination with our installers, we decided to have the beam cut into 3 segments to simplify the installation and avoid having to hire a crane.

The steel installers are separate from the fabricator. I called and interviewed a few different crews, but ended up hiring a pair of Polish workers who were recommended by the steel fabricator. These guys appeared to have a lot of experience, were very thorough in thinking about the staging and installation yet were surprisingly the least expensive with their pricing.

Hauling one of the 3 steel pieces up the stairs

All the pieces up in the flat

I have to admit i was very stressed out about the installation day as they would be slowly removing the old wooden structural wall while installing the beam. If anything went wrong the entire roof could collapse! I think I refrained from mentioning this minor detail to "Aglaya". Fortunately I could see very quickly that these really guys knew what they were doing.

Nov 26th - The first piece installed into the wall and tied up temporarily

Bracing the wood truss and removing part of the wood structural wall

Lifting the 2nd steel piece into place.

Tightening the splices

The finished beam!

Screwed

It's now definite: we have officially been left in the lurch in a very serious way.

André timed his trip here this time around the tentative dates that G.C. had given him. But there's no sign of G.C., and, as usual, we can't get hold of him at all. He's not responding to phone calls or emails...I don't think we can give him the benefit of doubt any more.

I can't imagine what would prompt a person to treat other people this way - I mean, if you're not going to follow through on something you said you'd do, fine...things come up, after all - but at least have the decency to TELL the person, please!?!

Anyway, no point in dwelling on how or why we're in this predicament, because the predicament is pretty bad, so we better focus on getting out of it. In short: we're going to have to figure out how to get this flat built, from scratch, entirely on our own. We're going to have to source all the materials and labour ourselves - and somehow figure out how to pay for it all, thanks to this unexpected turn of events.

Not So Much of a Party

A Party Wall sounds like much more fun that it actually is.

A Party Wall is a wall that acts as the boundary between buildings owned by different people. And, as we learned to our great dismay about a month ago, in the UK the Party Wall Act requires building owners to notify the adjoining owners if they want to do any work that will affect the wall. Work like cutting into the wall to attach a steel beam to it--which is exactly what we have to do.

Astonishingly, the local government handbook on the Act says specifically that "The Act contains no enforcement procedures for failure to serve a notice"! However, if you don't serve notice, and you start work, and the adjoining owner finds out, you could end up in court--definitely not a risk we were willing to take.

Apparently the Act was intended to facilitate people doing home improvements that involved party walls. How ironic--after going through the whole process, I can safely say that it's actually more of a disincentive than anything else. In theory, you can outline your proposed work to your neighbour, and get him to agree in writing that it's fine. But failing that, it becomes what is called a "dispute" What happens then is that you pay chartered surveyors to draw up an agreement about the work, and both parties sign it. The catch is that the person wanting to do the work has to pay all the costs of hiring the surveyors, which means the adjoining owner has absolutely zero incentive not to take it to "dispute", even if he doesn't actually have any objections!

So (you can guess where this is going), our proposal went into "dispute" even though our neighbour had no objections to our proposed work. In the end, we did finally get our Party Wall "Award", which was basically no different to what we had outlined before we were forced to hire the surveyors. So almost a full month later, and with a few thousand pounds less in the bank, we are finally ready to start work on that wall...

Waiting For G.C.

We haven't been to fussed so far about the fact that André was having a hard time reaching G.C. He'd go silent for a couple of weeks, but then re-emerge with a reason for the silence. The first time, it was an illness in the family. Fair enough - everyone has their own problems to deal with, it was just (from our own purely selfish point of view) rubbish timing. But in any case, we are still dealing with the Party Wall Agreement, not to mention awaiting Planning Permission for our proposed design and the final structural drawings from the engineer - so we wouldn't have been able to start construction anyway.

But it happened again - another long silence from G.C., and then the excuse that he had been ill. Now, I'm always one to give people the benefit of the doubt... but this is starting to look extremely suspicious. It has been next to impossible to reach the guy for nearly two months now! And even when André does get him on the phone, he won't commit to any specific dates in terms of coming over to get things going. I'm really starting to think that there's something awry here - and I'm starting to lose my patience...

Demolition and Removal

When I described the state of play to a friend, his eyes widened and he asked “Oh, so you bought just a shell?!” Actually, we did buy a full flat complete with walls, appliances and everything else – but everything was in such dire condition that we basically turned it into a shell !

It took 3 days to demolish everything, and 2 more days to get rid of all the debris. In the end, the debris filled two 12-yard skips (dumpsters)! That's probably 5-8 tonnes (tons) of debris!

Starting from the bedroom...

...and working our way towards the living room

The living room

Almost there!

A very full skip

The skip being hauled onto the truck.
It's so heavy the truck is actually doing a wheelie!

Demolition: Before and After

A few pictures showing the flat before and after demolition...

Demo: Before & After - View from top of stairs

Demo: Before & After - View from hallway

Demo: Before & After - View from living room

Demo: Before & After - View from living room to kitchen

Demo: Before & After - View of bathroom

Relief

What a relief!!!

OK, about a month later than planned, but at last, things are finally kicking off. G.C. showed up late last week, and I had been stopping by the flat after work in anticipation of seeing some progress... I would phone André from inside and say "Well, I don't think anything has been done yet..." Little did I know that once demo actually started, there could be no doubt whatsoever, since it looked like the flat had been the site of a medium-sized explosion!

Now that things are finally moving forward, I've gone ahead and given notice on the current rental flat. So our moving date early December. Thank God, that means just another month of paying both rent and mortgage... because to continue to do that is definitely not a viable proposition.

Demolition: Everything Goes

Everything had to go!

We got rid of, literally, everything but the kitchen sink! The ceiling, the walls, the bathroom (and all its fixtures), the kitchen appliances, the radiators… you get the idea.

To give ourselves a blank canvas, it was time for “demo”.

The pictures speak for themselves...

Demolition montage: View from the former kitchen

Demolition

Demolition montage: View from living room

Demolition

Demolition: View of the bedroom

Demolition: View towards entry

Demolition montage: View from former hallway

Waiting and Worrying

I'm starting to get nervous now. G.C., who is going to be leading the charge on all the construction work, told us last month that he would do the demolition work in September. But now we're halfway through September and there's no sign of him! André keeps trying to reach to him to get some exact dates from him, but he's suddenly become impossible to reach...

I guess I should explain. G.C. is a contractor/construction manager who André knows in NYC. When he heard that we were thinking of buying this flat, he volunteered to help us with the work. I was more than a little sceptical, but I guess the idea is that he's keen to do some more work in Europe. I was amazed that he actually came over to London - at his own expense - back in June, before we completed the purchase, to give the place a look over and give us a professional opinion about how much actual work would be required.

Anyway, I guess I'll hold off giving my two months' notice on the current rental flat until we have more of an idea what's going on with this guy...

The Design: Lofting a Victorian

 

When we first saw the flat, we had to really look past its dire condition (and the piles of rubbish) to see the potential. What really attracted my attention was idea of opening up the flat to the attic space - this also provided an opportunity to add a second floor, known in the UK as a loft conversion.

I knew straight away that I wanted to get rid of the ceiling and expose the wood structure that supports the roof - looking past the layers of dust, there was so much character, especially in the age and patina of the wood. Exposing the underside of the roof would also create a double-height, cathedral-style ceiling.

The Attic

The existing layout was awful - it would also have to go. So much wasted space! If the idea is to open up to the attic, then the plan would have to be opened up, and simplified. The living room space could be enlarged by re-locating the kitchen closer to the bathroom. This would effectively put all the “closed” room together as efficiently as possible into a single volume tucked under the 2nd level...you could almost say we’re lofting a Victorian flat...

 

Final Design - View from Dining Table

The trick to this became making everything fit into as small a area as comfortably possible so as to maximize the open space. As is often the case, it all came down to the bathroom and kitchen...and in this case it was all about the kitchen. After many sketches and schemes, I realized that the kitchen layout would be determined by the clever arrangement of the appliances...and that was about it--there was no extra space! The compact layout is hidden by losing two of the kitchen walls, opening the kitchen to the living area and adding a bar counter--which would help hide the “stuff” of a kitchen, as well as provide additional counter and entertaining space. Once this was worked out, the resulting dimensions set the wall of the living area, and the bathroom layout fell into place. 

Final Design - View from Living area

Final Design - View of Kitchen