The Project

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Next Steps for Fairbairn House

Interior renovations to the house have two main objectives. First, the new basement will become an autonomous, year-round community resource, providing two fully-equipped meeting rooms, a modern kitchen, washrooms, and an elevator for the handicapped. This basement area will become both seminar space for the Heritage Centre, and a welcome resource for rental to community groups and businesses.

Intended initially for three-season usage, both upper floors require insulation, electrical service and drywall, as well as refinished hardwood floors. The ground floor will house permanent exhibits, while the second floor will feature temporary exhibits on rotation with other museums.

Pictures of the current interior
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At the rear, the summer kitchen will become the main entrance, with a ramp to the verandah, a welcome area, information booth and boutique. The second floor of the kitchen with its gabled roof will provide office space for administration of the Centre.

Our first goal was to renovate....

Our first goal has been to renovate the exterior of the house and return it to its 1860s glory, protecting and preserving it for long-term use as a regional heritage centre. We reached this goal with the completion of outside work on the house in the summer of 2010.

The "before and after" images that follow show the work that has been carried out in this first phase of the project. See additional images in Photo Gallery.

Before renovations Click to enlarge	After renovations Click to enlarge

Enveloping the outside:
Our goal is to return the house to its 1860's glory, and to protect and preserve it for long-term use. Because the house was moved twice, there were some resulting ripples in the exterior cladding, and also sections that were badly weathered. The siding was removed, and the original 1" x 10" pine boards refastened as needed. Then new 1" x 6" pine shiplap - milled locally - was nailed horizontally over a full cover of Tyvek membrane for weather protection. While replacing siding, we discovered uneven amounts of cellulose fibre insulation between the studs. It will be replaced during interior renovations.

New verandah:
The original verandah had been destroyed during the moves, leaving only missing siding and one verandah half-post. To provide excellent exterior cover in all seasons for large groups, the new verandah extends along the front and down the complete south side. A metal roof with T+G cedar ceiling covers the 8-foot-wide walkway, which sits 20 inches above grade. To return to Victorian style, the 16 new pine verandah posts are exact copies of that original half-post. Using as pattern the verandah brackets on a local 1838 miller's house, a local sign-maker made 36 exact copies in pine. They feature a sunburst, thus complementing the sunburst motif above the dormer window. An 8-inch-deep cedar trellis between the posts completes the feel of a Victorian home.

Roofing:
The existing roof contained both ancient cedar shingles, and on top of those were steel shingles,the earliest form of metal roofing. We considered both for our renovations, but eventually rejected cedar shingles due to inevitable future replacement costs. Instead, we discovered a new product from Ideal Roofing designed for heritage homes,named "Hidden fasteners." We selected "Galvalume" as an appropriate colour, and by removing the stiffeners in the 16"wide sheets, we now have a roof which resembles the early days of metal roofing, with a thick metal content and no visible screws.

The Colours:
One coat of primer was applied, followed by two finishing coats. Colours were chosen to match those used in the mid-late 1800s. While original Fairbairn House colours are unknown, research determined that a typical wood house with verandah in the late 1800s would have a mid-tone body, darker trim, and pale sash (moveable parts of window). It wasn't until the turn of the century that an abrupt change in taste occurred: the body would have been a similar colour, but the sash would have been dark and the trim and accents a light colour. The mid-tone body colour used on Fairbairn, Kitsilano Gold, is a heritage colour discovered by research undertaken on wood houses of the late 1800s in Vancouver and area by Heritage Vancouver and Benjamin Moore paint company.