DIY

Products of the Week

Marvin Windows and Doors offers customized, high-performance windows and doors.

Nationwide industry leader bringing innovative and affordable new products to the architectural market every year that are purposeful and relevant to our customer's needs. US-made Cedar Architectural Accents: Brackets, Corbels, Tails, Porch and Gable Brackets, Screen Doors, Shutters, and Post Caps, Mantels and more.

Kitchen Cabinets, Counters, & Backsplashes

Crown Point Cabinetry offers custom cabinets for period style kitchens, baths, offices, laundry rooms, home bars and more. Styles include Shaker, Arts & Crafts, Early American, Victorian and Transitional.

Repairs & How To

Five unusual projects might inspire you to head to your local architectural salvage yard!

Patterns of colorful geometric tiles were common in the bathrooms and kitchens of California houses rooted in the design heritage of Spain, like Mission and Spanish Eclectic styles.

Web Exclusives

We take on vintage tile as our editors highlight new and classic articles.

Repairs & How To

It’s trendy to repurpose five-panel doors as headboards, and to up-cycle vintage hard-shell suitcases into dog beds. For restorers, the best use of architectural salvage is to replace missing architectural details that should never have been lost in the first place.

Repairs & How To

The case of the foul-smelling can of paint, and a fix.

Bliss used reclaimed barnwood for her cabinet frame to match the patina of the antique window.

Repairs & How To

From transforming antique doors into a fireplace surround or building a shelf using salvaged corbels and fence boards, we show you six different ways to breathe new life into old items.

Repairs & How To

Calcimine, old papers, peeling paint! Preparing the plaster substrate is the key to a good paint or wallpaper finish. In an old house, it’s not always an easy job: surprises likely lurk behind the recent latex and that floral vinyl upstairs.

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Although stained glass may appear to be stable, if the panes rattle when you drum on them with your fingertips, they need an application of fresh putty.

Repairs & How To

Vintage stained glass windows often need repairs. Learn tips and tricks so you can restore your stained glass.

Repairs & How To

Repurposing a round, exterior copper window to be used as a mirror frame took some imagination.

Interiors & Decorative Accessories

A designer makes a coat rack from a porch post.

Interiors & Decorative Accessories

Using vintage maps as window shades.

Repairs & How To

Faux finishing once was practiced by every house painter and many householders, who used inexpensive materials and simple techniques involving glazes, sponges, rags, and crumpled paper.

Repairs & How To

Learn basic preservation and documentation issues facing owners of buildings with leaded glass while also learning about common causes of deterioration and presents repair, restoration, and protection options.

Restoration Projects

Plaster in a historic building is like a family album. The handwriting of the artisans, the taste of the original occupants, and the evolving styles of decoration are embodied in the fabric of the building. From modest farmhouses to great buildings, regardless of the ethnic origins of the occupants, plaster has traditionally been used to finish interior walls.

Repairs & How To

Although there was some labor involved, this solution to a problem floor was inexpensive and remarkably effective.

Old-House Tips, Restoration Stories, & More

Keep your paintbrush good as new with these brush cleaning tips.

Repairs & How To

Smelly old-bathroom odors? We can help.

Restoration Projects

Nothing is more welcoming for family and guests than being greeted by a shipshape entry. Freshen up with these three doable projects: Hang an elegant door knocker, fix a sticky door, and perk up the trim.

There are two components of pocket-door hardware, decorative and functional: pulls and locksets, and the operating rollers and track.

Repairs & How To

This project involved fitting salvaged, antique art glass into panel doors that would slide into wall pockets. Art glass can, of course, be fitted into any panel door.