Historic homes will always have a certain nostalgic quality that can’t be found in modern homes.
So when an older house begins to experience problems, some homeowners look for ways to fix them without altering the house’s decades – or centuries – of character.
Fortunately, there are solutions to those problems.
Hope Restoration & General Contracting of Grandview Heights started out as a historic restoration company. {Though it now does remodels, additions and custom home-building, historic homes are still its bread and butter.
Though older homes may be outdated in functionality, Hope Restoration does everything possible to preserve the exterior, even when the interior needs a major overhaul.
“It’s worth the investment to preserve the older homes,” says owner Todd Renger. “Historic structures can be adapted internally to be appropriate for modern living. … They’re not laid out the same inside. We try to keep the historic structure and restore the outside.”
First and foremost, a historic home needs to be structurally sound. The foundation of an aged house may be prone to cracking, Renger says, and fixing that needs to be a top priority.
“Another thing is to make sure the roof is in good shape,” he says. “If it doesn’t need to have a lot of reinforcing and replacing, then we make sure the walls are true and plumb and straight. We have to make sure the house has good bones. You can sink a lot of money into making structural corrections.”
After the foundation is assuredly solid and sound, the next step is to make sure all the restorations blend seamlessly.
“If we’re doing an addition to a historic home, we’ll add baseboard casing so it doesn’t look like a new piece,” Renger says. “If a house has a slate roof, we use historic slate so that it blends and so you don’t see where the old house stops and new house begins.”
One project undertaken by Hope Restoration is a colonial brick home on Upper Chelsea Road in Upper Arlington
that was built in 1970. Plans for the house include demolition of back walls and installation of a 2,100-square-foot addition. Another UA house, a century-old structure on Tremont Road, is undergoing a total renovation in which the inside will be gutted and started anew.
Despite the problems historic homes sometimes present, preserving their authenticity is often well worth the trouble, Renger says.
“That’s the appeal,” he says. “It’s something you’re not going to find anymore.”
Corinne Murphy is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
