COTY award winning Bathroom!

We won a merit award for this bathroom!  A merit award is 2nd place, but the competition was fierce!! The winning bathroom was as much of a stunner as ours, and we did not envy the judges!  

From the basketweave tile floor to the frameless glass shower, every detail was carefully selected to add to feeling of spaciousness in this bath.  The original layout made the bathroom seem very cramped and small - and now it feels completely different! 

We placed the outlets lower than normal, so as not to disrupt the visual flow of the tile.  And the custom cabinets are recessed in-between studs, so they are extra deep inside! 

If only this was in our own house!!  We are lucky to call these clients friends, so maybe they will let us visit their sanctuary of a bathroom from time to time!

COTY Award Winner!

We are THRILLED to announce that we won THREE COTY (Contractor-Of-The-Year) awards from the Central Virginia chapter of NARI! (National Association of the Remodeling Industry)

We will be describing and featuring photos of the winning entries over the next few days. 

First up, a Grand Prize award in the category: Interior or Exterior specialty. 

We remodeled a gorgeous turn-of-the-century porch in Church Hill!

Each hand rail was painstakingly reconstructed.  Very few of the original pieces could be re-used, so we had special knives made and milled nearly every piece! 

We were fortunate that this porch is part of a historic block of matching homes, and we could compare this one to its neighbors to insure accuracy! 

The result is stunning! 

Chimney days

Here at HQ, we have some chimneys.  They are fancy and lovely... and old, and in need of some love.  So we are showing them some love.  ​

Here's the imposing exterior side:​

The one on the left is the one we are loving at the moment.  The very top section has been removed, it will match the one on the right when we put it back together.​

Inside, we're installing gas fireplaces:​

There is a 3rd, but it was too shy to be photographed on picture day.​

Getting the flues open has been a bigger job than expected! The upper part of the chimney had a definite lean to it, and we discovered that a prior attempt to ​repair it.  The craftsman of the past had FILLED the flue with bricks, and not just loose bricks, they'd been cemented in... Stable, yes! Easy to undo? No!

Here's are some images of the dismantling:​

This is the same chimney from 2 angles - I nearly had a heart attack upon seeing these, so I wanted to share the shocking images.  This chimney has 3 flues, and the pipes coming out of the center flue are for the gas fireplace unit - the left and right flues were solid with bricks, and will also have pipes when they are finished being re-opened.​

Here's the top view:​

All three are now open, and soon we'll be on the path to putting them back together!! 

More information and photos as it becomes available!​