Great resources

Last night, my good friend C and I went to a lecture at the public library - part of a series about historic restoration and renovation. What a great resource! The speaker, who is a historic preservation consultant, pointed us to several great resources, so I thought I'd pass some on.

First, I really liked getting a better understanding of the differences between preservation, rehabilitation, restoration, and reconstruction. Here's the main page for the Park Service's standards on those. Apparently we (like most other people who are living in older homes) are doing rehab.

Dig down a bit deeper and you get to some really great advice and technical info about old houses in the Preservation Briefs series - for example, the window repair page we've referred to before. It's like a manual for your old house!

These resources made me think of a couple of my favorites, on windows - the National Trust's wood window tip sheet (guess what - they're not suggesting vinyl replacement! :)

and Robert Schweitzer's paint color site (and his books are great too).

All in all, it was a lovely evening - complete with tea and cookies - and we're thrilled to live in such a great city. Bangor turns 175 tomorrow (the city is throwing a party with cake, even!), so Happy Birthday, Queen City!