We were asked the question about our previous post “A Window of Opportunity”
What’s wrong with the old windows?
My answer started to get so long I decided to make it a post instead of a comment. To answer the question: They’re pretty old, and don’t work well anymore – particularly the storm windows and screens. On some of the windows it’s impossible to pull the storm down. Some don’t even have a storm window, a must here in Chicago. Especially since I don’t fancy putting up plastic sheeting every winter. Some don’t have a screen, another must since mosquitoes are highly attracted to me!
If you look at the current “lastest pics” picture, it shows the backyard, and you can see the metal frames on the windows are pretty unattractive. This is even more true on the front of the house.
For the sunroom, we are cutting in entirely new bigger windows in some places, and so want the rest of the house to match these so they don’t look like such an addition, but are integrated with the rest.
It’s a good question. It made me stop and think for a minute, did we really need that? I think sometimes you get so caught up in remodeling, it can be easy to change things without a purpose or consciously thinking about why. But change for change’s sake is not always improvement.
I enjoyed his post about this at the blog “Keepin’ It Real“ and I agree, that if you can restore you should (hence the many man hours spent restoring the trim around the house). Particularly in these older homes, the stuff around your house is of far better quality than you could get today even if you wanted to spend the money. If our windows were nice wood windows (the kind of casements shown in the windows post), or old counter-weight double hungs we would definitely keep them. I have reglazed and restored windows before with the Martin’s at Greene & Burke, so that is not the daunting task. But ours are aluminum inside and out, were cheap to begin with, and in my opinion, not worth the effort.
