These plans are "dream plans", so they include everything that we would want to do to the house now and in the long run. We are not sure how much of these plans we will be able to get done in the first phase of the renovation. We do know that we are definitely going to remove and replace the back section of the house with a new kitchen and mud room/pantry. We are also going to have to redo almost all of the utilities in the house, so by the time we are done with that we may not be able to do much more.
One aspect of the renovation that we have been unsure of is wether or not there is an existing fire place already in the living room. There is currently a fireplace in the sitting room and the office. Traditionally, both colonials and capes have centrally located fireplace that has hearths on all three sides in order to provide heat for the whole first floor. It seemed like there should be another fireplace in the living room. I figured that the fireplace must have been built over at some point and was probably behind the wall. So, of course, I had to look. Here is a picture of the wall before I started:
Took a couple of knocks with hammer and sure enough:
Those look like bricks to me, so lets look a little more....
OK. Not what I really expected, but that looks like a cemented over flue for a wood stove. We need to look a little further.
Really not what I expected. It appears that the old stone fireplace was patched over with bricks and extended to the current sitting room. A very strange setup. Not sure exactly what is going on here, one thing you can see is the granite field stones that are backing everything up. You can see the field stones behind the bricks in this picture:
Interesting. Not sure what to do from here. We have a walk through with the architect and structural engineer in two weeks, so this one might have to wait until then.
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