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A rare 2-week trip to work on the house – Day 3

Today is Friday, April 12. The challenge for today was the removal of drywall-wall, as well as the ceiling and wall plaster in stairway area, while trying to keep most of the dust from falling into the first floor area. We also were able to start the removal of wall and pitched ceiling plaster in green room.

So what did we all encounter while doing this. First of all the removal of the drywall section. Because it was a small section of wall with some corners, we ran into many studs, which made for a strong wall, but also made removing the drywall extremely time consuming. After the wall was removed, we had to build a temporary railing around the stairs to keep the workplace safe. The second part was to cover the stairway opening with a tarp, such that most of the debris would end up on the tarp on the landing of the stairs, instead of down the stairs.

Before: Here you can see the drywall section that created a little hallway between the two rooms, separating them from the stairway. (this house used to be spllit into two apartments. The left door opening was the entrance of the apartment, and the right door was the connection to the bedroom of the apartment.
After removal of the drywall and the plaster in the hallway, we had to create a temporary railing. We did not replace the old railing, which was way too low. The dark wall (left from the center of the picture) is shiplap (tongue-and-groove) wood. The ‘splotches’ are the remains of some sort of cardboard based covering, which in turn was covered by wood-paneling. Neither one of these coverings were very attractive.

As you can tell from these two pictures, we also started to remove some of the studs in the wall that separates the master bedroom from the stairs. That work will be completed on Saturday. The intent is to make that wall have only one (centered) door opening.

Lastly, we started removal of the lath and plaster in the small room on the other side of the stairs. We tried to finish the removal but we both ran out of steam and decided to call it a day. The only thing left to do in that room was the removal of the ceiling and some of the lower rows of lath on the walls.