Tag: Home & Design

With six previous renovations under their belts, Frank and Rebecca Gristina had lots of practice sizing up old houses. When Rebecca, accompanied by her mother, came to see a 1906 farmhouse in western Albemarle, she quickly noticed promising signs. This was despite the fact that the place had been uninhabited and was so uninviting that even the realtor was reluctant to step inside.

“It was early spring, and you could see the mountains through the trees,” Rebecca says, adding that she also liked the size of the windows and some other structural details. “That potential starts peeping in.”

Perhaps bolstered by their experience with houses, the trust between the couple was such that Frank okayed making a bid on the house even before he’d seen it in person. From the beginning, the Gristinas knew they would need to plan a large addition to make the house work for their family of five. They also knew that tearing down the old portion wasn’t an option.

“It was solid,” says Frank. “You could have torn it down, but you’re throwing away a thousand square feet of history.”

In this spirit, the couple asked architect Scott Weiss to design a two-floor addition to include an open kitchen/dining/living space, a master suite, two kids’ bedrooms and lots of storage. The original house would offer a sitting room, an office and another bedroom—and it would be, Weiss says, “the jewel.” Rather than imitating its look, the new portion would be complementary.

Laying out the space, Weiss says, was simple, because he and the clients knew that the rooms should face the rear. This was partly to take advantage of views, and partly for the safety of a son with autism, who needs to be discouraged from heading toward the road.

“It all fell right into place,” he says: hallways along the front, with bedrooms and public spaces along the back. And he found ways to make it easier for his clients to keep eyes and ears on their son—for example, by creating a seating nook in the upstairs hallway, just around the corner from his room.

The original portion of the house would remain low-tech (no plumbing) and charmingly funky, with so few straight lines that the clients nicknamed it “Wabi-Sabi” after the Japanese aesthetic that prizes flawed beauty. Weiss designed the addition as a contemporary farmhouse, with shiplap interior walls to suggest a house-within-a-house. The heart of it is the great room, where big windows and French doors invite the family to look and perhaps even to step outside.

“We cook a lot and never understood the formal dining room,” says Frank. Instead, this one flows seamlessly into the kitchen, and a sitting area facing a TV in a niche lined with reclaimed wood.

The kitchen is relaxed and open with few upper cabinets and a big island near the bank of three windows over the farmhouse sink. White and gray backsplash tile echoes the hues of the soapstone and quartz countertops, allowing a royal-blue stove and range hood to come forward as an accent.

“We’re in here 80 percent of the day,” says Frank.

The hallways running the length of the addition, upstairs and downstairs, manage to be a destination in themselves. “The problem was to make it not feel like this giant hallway,” says Weiss. Carefully spaced niches and doorways break up the hallways’ long length. Perpendicular to the first floor hall, an axis connects the front door with the French doors near the dining table, providing a mountain view to visitors even before they come inside.

Whereas Weiss initially designed the house with many windows and exits, his clients’ concerns about their son prompted him to trim them back. “We wanted no windows that open to the front,” says Frank. So Weiss designed small “barn windows” to be placed high on the walls of the upstairs hall, allowing light but not much view, and turned some downstairs doors into windows.

One window on the front did become a focal point—a large square broken into smaller squares and rectangles, à la Mondrian. Weiss had specified this as one oversized pane; Frank played with the idea of breaking it up (“I made it look like a spreadsheet,” he jokes); then Weiss reined in the idea by relating the window sections to the ratios of other windows in the house. “That was the benefit of having an architect,” says Rebecca.

The girls in the family have identical bedrooms with a Jack-and-Jill bathroom between; their brother has a room in the old portion that can, when he is older, become a private suite of sorts. Weiss gave their parents a gem of a master bath, with corner windows over a soaking tub, patterned floor tile and a barrier-free glass-walled shower.

The century-old farmhouse has entered a new era, married happily to a newer and hardworking partner.

In a county like Albemarle, where vigorous growth routinely fills in open space with new homes, it’s reassuring to know there are still places where the opposite has happened. Wilhoit Mill Farm, near Earlysville, is one of those bucolic spots: a onetime rural village that’s less populated now than it was in the past.

That’s not to say it’s abandoned; quite the opposite. Though the village of Wilhoit—which once boasted its own post office—isn’t here anymore, the site is still lovingly inhabited. Wilhoit Mill these days is a 25-acre farm centered on a spotless 1850s farmhouse, which continues to serve as a family home. The old millhouse that lends the farm its name, as well as several other village buildings, are still standing, arrayed in a protected bottomland around the Lynch River.

“It’s amazing to think people have been living here for over 150 years,” says one of the current owners, who bought the property in 2006. They had been searching for a property with land and a historical pedigree, and found both at Wilhoit Mill: wooded and open acreage, and a history stretching back well before the Civil War, to when the Wilhoit brothers, Ezekiel Jr. and Milton, ran a grist mill just a stone’s throw from Milton’s house.

A bonus for these buyers: The house needed little in the way of renovation. “We didn’t want to have to do a house,” says one owner. “We just needed to do some landscaping.” The original antebellum home had already been extensively added onto, modernized and updated.

Layered details

The house is a pastiche of eras. Thanks to traditional detailing, as the owners say, “it all flows together.” Its original portion, an I-house—that is, a two-over-two colonial farmhouse—has a classically symmetrical façade. It gained a rear addition in 1900, which made the house an L shape and now boasts a double porch, the lower part of which is screened. In 1997, two more large additions brought the home into the 21st century, adding considerable living space and functionality.

The result is a far cry from the simple, one-room-deep dwelling pictured in historical photos. These days, the house is a showplace, with custom stonework and neat garden beds complementing its substantial form. Prominent placement is given to the millstone from the mill: in the center of the flagstone walkway leading to the front door.

The original section is a visual and historical anchor for the home, while the additions hold the spaces where the family most often gathers. “The original is still very original,” says an owner—meaning the beautiful floors, windows and woodwork (and working fireplaces) but also a lack of insulation. More recent portions are considerably more comfortable.

Still, the original heart of the home—wide center hallway, parlor, dining room and two upstairs bedrooms—has an unmistakable magnetism. Paneling and scrollwork on the main staircase are the old house’s fanciest touches; in essence it is a vernacular structure meant to house a hardworking family. The owners puzzle over what must have been a costly extra—a second staircase in the dining room. Were there, perhaps, two families living here, in need of privacy?

What’s certain is that later stewards of the property found ways to raise the luxury factor considerably. More than a century ago, the house gained a rear addition that now contains the kitchen on the first floor and a bedroom on the second, both of them opening onto long porches. (Old photos show that this addition was originally smaller, with no second-floor porch; it seems that each generation of occupants has left its mark on the house’s form.)

The current owners found the kitchen recently updated, with cream-colored Shaker cabinetry, granite countertops and beadboard ceiling. Their only change was to enlarge windows looking onto the screened porch. A sitting area near the fireplace—which has been fitted with a small woodstove—adds a note of gentility to the room.

The most recent additions, made nearly a century later, address modern wants and needs. On one end of the original I-house, a new sitting room provides built-in bookcases and a TV niche, a large bay window and a nook that luckily made a place for the current occupants to hang a large, beloved horse painting.

Extending along the rear is a garage and mudroom that supports a second-floor master suite with a sauna, two bathrooms and a hallway lined with built-in cabinets. The mudroom is as pleasant a place to spend time as any parlor or sitting room; it has a slate floor, a wall of windows and enough room for a center organizing table and a desk. Of course, the requisite hooks and cubbies are here too, and the nearby bathroom boasts a steam shower.

Living history

Such a property inevitably leads its occupants to curious speculation about the past. “When we first moved in, we would look through those windows on bleak winter days, and think about what it was like to live here” in the 19th century, says the owner.

Old orchards, family cemeteries and even the old bricks in the hearths seem to speak of earlier eras. It’s said that General George Custer camped in the hayfield during the Civil War, but even if that bit of lore isn’t verifiable, many lives have undoubtedly been lived on these acres, including those of enslaved people whose cabins were at one time in the nearby hills.

As much as the history, it is the quietude and beauty of this piece of land that its owners love—a place where they can swim in their own river in the summer. “I grew up in California in a place that was rural,” says one. “Kids ran around and everybody had a horse. This is a replication of that.”

The solidity of the wide brick house off Garth Road is broken in just one place: Look in the front door, and your gaze can travel all the way through the back of the house to the distant mountains. It’s a moment in which the landscape asserts itself, thanks to the placement of a large glassed-in rear porch. “I fell in love with that view,” says the owner of the day in 2014 when she first glimpsed it.

But she knew that the landscape design around the house was not framing that view the way it should. “We needed a better approach,” she says. A new parking court made way for a big change: The lackluster front garden became a showpiece, with walkways that magnify the impact of the mountain vista.

A bluestone path leads the eye (and the feet) down a long axis straight to the front door, dividing a formal garden down the middle as it goes. Another perpendicular path forms a cross, sectioning this boxwood-framed area into four quadrants. Though the owner, at previous residences, had had gardens in a looser English cottage style, this one is a classic geometric parterre.

“The brick walls were here; we worked within it,” she says. “It’s a real perennial garden. There’s always something to look at.”

Each quadrant is anchored by a Cornus constellation dogwood and bordered by boxwoods. Within these outlines, a riot of blooms fills the space and the calendar: Tall Annabelle and paniculata limelight hydrangeas along the far edges, then lavender, penstemon, bee balm and toad lilies. White hyacinths fill the small squares around each central dogwood; baptisia and butterfly weed attract pollinators. Peonies give color in early summer and daisies in mid-summer; hellebores light up in late winter next to the graceful skeletons of last year’s sedum.

This formal garden is impressive in itself, but what really sets it off are the looser plantings along the driveway and in the other beds near the house. The owner and her husband have named their property Choill Mhor—Gaelic for “Great Woods”—in honor of the forest that surrounds the home and lawn. To approach the house by car is to wind through a section of forest that, when they first arrived, was riddled with invasive species.

“In two and a half years you can really clean a place up,” says the owner, who was keen to learn which of the established plants were natives and which didn’t belong. Japanese stiltgrass, a common invasive that was prevalent in these woods, was the major nemesis. After removing the stiltgrass, she had dozens of native dogwood and redbud trees planted along the edge of the woods, to be visible from the driveway. Thousands of daffodils bring early-spring color and resist hungry deer, too.

An original garden shed was covered in vines; she restored it as a functional shed and a focal point beneath mature magnolia, pine, holly and cryptomeria trees. Nearby planting beds feature epimedium ground cover and fringe trees for summer interest, with more daffodils and hellebores for late winter and spring.

On the west side of the house, impressive oaks and poplars provide the structure while newly planted dogwood and redbud promise to bring color and delicacy to the landscape. A pollinator garden, rescued from a tangle of bramble, now hosts echinacea, rudbeckia, bee balm and oakleaf hydrangea. Aster, too—“Boy, did it perform!” enthuses the owner.

A towering grandiflora magnolia anchors the side yard. “You just work around those,” the owner acknowledges. Same with the red oak on the back side of the house, which sports a dreamy wooden swing and marks the beginning of the property’s best feature: a mowed allée leading downhill to a small lake.

At the uphill end, she planted a shade garden with ghost ferns, lady ferns, Solomon’s seal and bleeding hearts. More ferns, plus azaleas and Japanese maples, fill in planting beds on this, the north side of the house.

Here and there, sculptures, birdbaths and containers provide moments of interest to break up the swaths of foliage and color. Just outside the kitchen door is an herb garden (in winter, filled with pansies and camellia), as well as a fringe tree that attracts finches to enliven the morning coffee ritual inside. Espaliered pear trees mark an arched breezeway connecting the patio to the pea-gravel parking court.

It’s a lovely place to stroll, and a lovely to view, too, from indoors—especially from the glassed-in porch, which the current owners use as a dining room. The mountain view can be part of every meal.

A walk among the flowers

In addition to Choill Mhor and the usual suspects, such as Morven Estate and the University of Virginia’s Pavilion gardens, this year’s Historic Garden Week (April 22-29) features four other Charlottesville and Albemarle residences open for tours.

Southfield

Over the past 17 years, the owners of this 20-acre property have added outbuildings, hardscaping, an infinity-edged pool and gardens in every direction. The landscape includes many unusual native and non-native plants, winter flowering shrubs and winding paths toward water features at various points.

Midway (above)

As per the original blueprint of this Albemarle landscape, laid out by designer Charles Gillette in 1936, a portion of the garden is dedicated to a selection of roses that blooms in a continuum of intense to pale color. Don’t miss the house, too: an early 19th-century farmhouse on a former hemp, flax and tobacco plantation.

The Laing House

Many years of living in Asia and England influenced the owners of this wooded property off Ridge Road, which features a Georgian-influenced home filled with Asian artifacts and furnishings, as well as an extensive art collection. Surrounding the house are informal gardens developed over the last nine years that feature Japanese maples and azaleas, spring bulbs and a double-blossom dogwood.

Fox Ridge

An active equestrian farm on 280 acres, this Farmington Hunt Club property boasts a 200-year-old log cabin, a cemetery dating to the late 1700s and the main house, a Neo-Georgian structure built in 1945. Find a boxwood parterre garden, vegetable garden and arrays of hellebores, hostas, daffodils and lily of the valley.

Visit vagardenweek.org for more information.

Here’s one for the dreamers: Monticola, a nearly 300-acre estate on the James River, is for sale. If you’ve never heard of Monticola, you’re not alone. Despite its rich history, it claims little fame and has never really been a public place. Now, spiffed up for a turn on the market, it’s ready for a look-see and a bit more notoriety.

There’s a lot to appreciate about this place. Built by a bank president in the 1850s, the home has seen every typical milestone of that Southern icon, the plantation home.

There was a period of antebellum prosperity, with original owners Daniel James and Elizabeth Carrington Hartsook heading up a large family and an even larger staff, including 25 slaves. There was the crisis of the Civil War, including a couple of days in which Union General Philip Sheridan commandeered the house as his headquarters and the family hid their valuables in a makeshift compartment under a bedroom floor. There was financial trouble, a sale to another family and a single heiress—Miss Emily Nolting —who lived alone in the house for more than 40 years and welcomed Howardsville neighbors to stop by her oversized dwelling. And, after Miss Emily’s time, there was a period of neglect when the house sat abandoned.

Monticola has some surprising chapters in its past, too. In 1940, it was briefly taken over by a Hollywood crew for the filming of a big-budget movie called (aptly enough) Virginia. Then, in the ’80s, it became the seat of an artists’ commune called Akwenasa, whose best-known member was Desmond Child (songwriter for Kiss and Bon Jovi, among others).

Acreage has shrunk and grown over the years, the landscape has altered and Howardsville itself has undergone vast changes, including disastrous floods in 1969 and 1972. But the house has stood solidly for 160 years or so, and despite times of deterioration, it has largely maintained its original form.

“Nobody ever really messed with it,” is how Frank Root puts it. He’s the president of Countryside Service Company, a Staunton firm that bought the property in 2005. Fortunately, he says, “We had a great home to start with.” Neglect there may have been, but the house had escaped shoddy remodeling.

With the help of the architects at Staunton-based Frazier Associates, Root’s company planned a landmark restoration, one that aimed for historical sensitivity. That goal wasn’t at odds with another aim, that of luxury. After all, this was an upper-crust kind of place from the start, with 10′ ceilings and 18-by-18′ rooms that are still capacious even by today’s standards.

The house needed plaster repairs, utility updates and the like; all the spaces are freshly painted and pristine, and gleaming heart pine floors set off the fireplaces that anchor every room. But the more exciting changes are in the kitchen and bathrooms, where Frazier helped to engineer modernization that, Root says, “didn’t detract from the historical nature of the house.”

In the kitchen, that means soapstone counters and all the usual gourmet touches. The Hartsooks might not have recognized the stainless-steel wall ovens, but they would be very familiar with the fireplace. Massive pocket doors to the adjoining parlor could remain open if it were to serve as a family’s main living space, or closed if a more formal dining room were called for.

Upstairs, one of four original bedrooms was sacrificed to create two bathrooms—nice ones, with bowl sinks and other nods to contemporary tastes. Amazingly, this big old house had only one bathroom before, so its current three and a half represent a significant jump indeed.

In the basement (or “ground level,” as it’s called, emphasizing its well-lit nature), rotting floor structures were replaced and the spaces finished for use as guest quarters, game room and whatever else someone wants to do that won’t fit in the giant rooms upstairs.

It’s charming to discover some of the ways that the renovators honored the history here, like a bathroom window where little Bertie Nolting back in 1893 etched his name right into the glass. This artifact was painstakingly preserved. Countryside also enlarged the front porches, which—thanks to a pre-1900 photo—they were able to prove had been downgraded at some point in the past. Now they’re back to their grand original form.

From the cupola that tops the roof—with four, count them four, chimneys serving as corner posts for a protective rail around the structure—the situation becomes clear. This is a castle, and you are the monarch. You’re surveying three counties and under your feet is a jewel of a house. Big boxwoods define the curving driveway; a swimming pool beckons from the side lawn. The romantic, semicircular back porches overlook a lawn studded with awe-inspiring trees. Beautiful brick walks connect the old outbuildings (chicken coop, smokehouse, etc.).

Most of us can only dream. The asking price for this prize is upward of $4 million. Perhaps we should hope that whoever decides to spend the money will find a way to share Monticola with the public. If not, we’ll just have to rent the movie.

Monticola’s renovation necessitated plaster repairs, utility updates and a fresh coat of paint. But architecture firm Frazier Associates also made some exciting changes to the kitchen, with the addition of soapstone countertops and stainless steel appliances, while still honoring the home’s historical details.

Property details

Address: 4336 Monticola Rd., Esmont

MLS#: 557952

Year built: 1850s

Acreage: 292

Bedrooms: 4

Baths: 3.5

Square footage (finished): 6,800

Jeff Dreyfus and Bob Headrick have always loved their house. It is a special place—very progressive when it was built in 1933, predating by decades most other local examples of modern architecture. Its International Style design is bold and crisp, built with geometric planes of white accented by black. Yet by 2002, when the couple purchased it, it was in some ways like many old houses: It suffered from dated finishes and didn’t quite suit a contemporary lifestyle.

Headrick’s and Dreyfus’ relationship with the house, then, has always had change at its core; in fact, their first renovation began the day after they bought it. Teasing out the potential of this structure, found in the Lewis Mountain neighborhood, has been a long process, occurring in three phases to date (with a fourth still to come). Photos show what the couple has achieved: They’ve expanded and updated with the utmost respect for the house’s inherent qualities, creating in effect a more modern version of its original modernism.

“It looks seamless,” says Dreyfus, principal of Bushman Dreyfus Architects. “To me the fun challenge is to make it all seem like it belongs together.”

What’s also remarkable is that phases I (2002) and II (2004) included adding some elements that would actually disappear in phase III. “The incremental approach is best,” says Dreyfus. “You don’t know how you’re going to live in a house when you buy it.” Living with the first renovations for more than a decade allowed him and Headrick to more fully understand what they wanted and ultimately made for a better phase III.

To give one small example, phase II included the addition of multiple large closets in what was then the master bedroom. While these were very effective at hiding belongings behind minimal white doors (the two like to maintain a spare dwelling), the closets turned out to have a downside. “It’s not easy living with closet doors on everything,” says Dreyfus. Far more practical, they realized, would be a walk-in closet in which all items were within reach at the same time.

When, in phase III, a bigger and better master bedroom came along, the better closet came too. Not only that, but the necessity of working with property setback lines engendered an angled exterior wall on this new bedroom addition—which allowed a second entrance to what’s ultimately a walk-through closet. Doorless, but with contents hidden from view, the space is a model of convenience.

Meanwhile, some of those phase II closets came out, to be replaced by a small workspace with a built-in desk. The former bedroom turned into a sitting room, a more intimate counterpoint to the large original living room. “It’s nice to have the lower ceiling” in the new room, says Dreyfus. “They are two spaces, for larger and smaller groups.” A modern fireplace and a view of the pool and landscape make this new seating area deliciously inviting.

And it’s a better companion to the adjacent dining area than the bedroom had been. Notwithstanding a drop-down privacy screen, the bed had still essentially been in a space contiguous with the dinner party spot, which, says the couple, never felt quite right.

Outside the sitting room, a new porch overlooks the pool deck. Headrick and Dreyfus had intended to screen it—they even had the screens on hand—but realized once it was framed that it would feel “too claustrophobic” if enclosed. “While I don’t relish living in a renovation,” says Dreyfus, “every day you can look at it and you can make adjustments.” Accordingly, he and Headrick, a realtor, decided to skip the screens. They’d banish bugs with ceiling fans instead, and created clerestory openings at the top of one wall, for even more light.

The porch is supported by black columns—steel with wood surround—that mimic existing black window and door frames. “They lighten the whole visual,” says Dreyfus. “The black disappears.” White brick walls and a metal trellis blend seamlessly with their older counterparts, making it hard to tell where the 1933 house ends and the addition, completed 80 years later, begins.

The porch offers a view of an expanded landscape scheme that includes stone walls and planting beds, designed by landscape architect Anne Pray. Another lesson learned through experience: The front walk, formerly made of bluestone stepping stones, has given way to a continuous aggregate-and-stone walkway. “We learned that everybody has a different stride, and your stride is different going uphill than going down,” says Headrick. “Visually, it looked awesome, but it wasn’t practical.”

A redrawn entry sequence is the last major component of this phase, offering a clearer and more capacious way for guests to arrive, aligned with the primary axis through the living room and kitchen. The wide stairwell to the second floor, housing the guest quarters, is now more private, and there is space for a powder room near the front door.

Dreyfus and Headrick say the slowly unfolding renovation owes its success to the passage of time. “If we’d had unlimited funds in the beginning,” says Headrick, “we wouldn’t have done this.”

Every year since 2009, the Shelter for Help in Emergency has hosted its Design House event, taking a local home that’s on the market and transforming it with the assistance of some of Charlottesville’s best interior designers, landscape designers and local vendors. Proceeds from tours of the home benefit the nonprofit, which provides safe environments for survivors of domestic violence. This year, however, SHE is changing its format, opening a Design House every other year rather than annually.

“The decision to move the Design House to an alternate year format is one that we have been contemplating for some time,” says SHE fundraising and development coordinator Sarah Ellis. “We wanted to establish the event in the Charlottesville community and have gone all out putting it on each year.”

While you’ll have to wait until spring of 2018 to enjoy the next event (which Ellis says will be “even bigger and better” than before), Natural Retreats’ Bundoran Farm is providing an alternate opportunity.

The 2,300-acre rural community in Albemarle (and the site of the 2015 Southern Living Idea House) is offering Derry Cottage, its recently completed five-bedroom, four-bathroom show home, for tours April 1-15, Wednesday to Sunday. It’s not an official SHE Design House, but proceeds will benefit the nonprofit.

You’ll see the handiwork of a few familiar faces: Green Mountain Construction designed and built the modern farmhouse, Javier Becerra handled the landscaping and Wendi Smith, founder of Leftover Luxuries, oversaw the interior design, pulling in wares from local vendors like Patina Antiques, The Shade Shop, Yves Delorme and Blanc Creatives (among others!) to complete each room.

Tickets, available at the door, are $20 per tour. For more information, visit explorebundoranfarm.com.

What might have been Thomas Jefferson’s original vision for the Monticello rooftop railings is almost restored.

Years ago, when the balustrade on TJ’s mountaintop home rotted away, it was replaced with a new design. Last year, working from paintings, sketches and notes, architectural firm Mesick Cohen Wilson Baker Architects was able to re-create the original design. And Charlottesville’s Gaston & Wyatt is in the process of remaking and installing the balustrades atop the little mountain. The north-facing railings are nearly complete, and the south-facing side is about halfway done.

“In between the [upper and lower boards] is sandwiched pickets,” Gaston & Wyatt VP Keith Cutts says. “On top of them, they are sharpened to a point, per Thomas Jefferson’s instructions. All of that is put together with wrought iron nails that were provided to us by Monticello…which is essentially how Jefferson intended it to be put together.”

For Monticello, several factors—wood rot, a failing deck, faithfulness to the original design—influenced the decision to scrap the existing balustrade and completely remake it. But how should the average homeowner make decisions about restoring or replacing historical wood details?

In the first place, he should try to preserve the wood and avoid rot.

“Every architectural detail or component has a different situation and would be treated differently, but the number one thing from keeping a piece of wood from rotting is proper maintenance,” Cutts says. “If your paint is chipped or chipping away, you should be sanding down to raw wood and re-priming and painting.”

Rot doesn’t necessarily mean historic wood is done for. The trick is catching the problem before it becomes serious, according to carpenter Gary Lettan. “You really don’t know until you see it happening,” he says. “And you have to detect the source of the problem.”

Fortunately, Lettan says “there are a lot of ways of going about saving embellishments.” A minimal amount of rot can be sanded away and crafted into the original shape using epoxy filler, for example.

“With the epoxy-based products, which are the consistency of playdough, the idea is you scrape away and remove the rotten material as much as possible, pack it in the void and use hand tools and sanders to cut it back down to the profile,” local woodworker Todd LeBack says.

To determine the extent of wood rot, LeBack says an ice pick or knife can be inserted into the work piece to plumb its depth. And homeowners should make sure to get opinions from multiple contractors.

It’s not economical to have a small amount of woodwork completely redone, so that’s where the epoxy comes in. If none of the wood is salvageable, LeBack says you can find most of the historic dies used to create details in the Albemarle area from Gaston & Wyatt.

If the specific profile you need isn’t available, it’s possible to recreate historic wood details using router bits and hand saws, LeBack says, but the process can be costly. Alternatively, you could go with a slightly different design that still preserves the historic character of the piece and the overall look and feel of the home.

“People tend to copy what’s already out there,” Lettan says. “If you can’t copy something, you usually change the whole room so that you come close to what’s there, as long as your continuity continues through the whole house.”

LeBack agrees and says that fortunately you can usually come close to the original with what’s commercially available. Or, you could rely on luck.

“I was working on an old farmhouse, and they took the old plaster off the wall,” he says. “They actually found the molding plane that was used to make some of the trim on the house. They made the historic trim with the exact same hand plane.”