Revolving TV: Now with 100% More TV!

I spent a lot of time describing the construction of the rotating TV wall. However, I recently realized that I had never actually posted a picture of the wall with the TV and speakers installed. The TV is 70" and can be viewed easily from anywhere in the main area of the loft: kitchen, dining area, or entertainment area. When the wall is facing the entertainment area (as shown in this picture) the surround sound speakers in the walls opposite of the TV turn on. The sound is controlled by a Control4 controller, and was installed locally by Interscapes. Sound and music can easily be routed to anywhere in the loft.

Backhoe Submarine

Artwalk was a great success this weekend, bringing in over 10,000 visitors into the Loft District. People filled the streets shopping for art, listening to music, seeing live performances, and visiting lofts and businesses in the area. Before the event we had a pretty nasty storm, and it revealed a few minor leaks that needed to be patched, but nothing terrible. However, we had been digging out the garage floor to sink the grease traps for El Barrio. We had so much rain that the ground water came up and filled in the hole, submersing a small backhoe that the subcontractors were using.

After the water went back down the subs were able to recover the backhoe. Luckily the water didn't harm the backhoe, and they were able to finish sinking the trap.

Despite the storm they've made a lot of progress recently. Beside the traps, El Barrio's framing is complete and they even started installing sheetrock yesterday.

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Artwalk 2011

Just a quick note to remind you that Artwalk is this weekend, September 9th and 10th. I won't have the building open because I will be working the event. However, I intend to leave the lights on so that people can look in the window and check out El Barrio's progress. If you are new to Artwalk, here's a great guide that should tell you everything you need to know. Hope to see you there!

Concrete... Oooh my!

Still breathing heavy from my scorching-hot 3-part series featuring piles of dirt? Well hold on to you pants. We're getting to the good stuff: concrete slabs. What?! Not enough, you say? OK, maybe I can throw in a little framing, but that's gonna cost you extra. The original pine floors were removed in El Barrio's bar and kitchen areas in order to replace them with concrete. For a professional kitchen, concrete is much safer and easier to clean. The wood was salvaged to be used in other places. After pouring concrete, framing began for the bar and some interior rooms.

The same day the contractor poured El Barrio's floor they also poured concrete in the residential entrance. Some of the wood at the residential entrance was damaged. We've tried to reuse and repair any of the original pine that we could, but here we cut out the rotten boards at a diagonal to be replaced with this concrete. It's pretty dirty in the picture below, but it's intended to add a little drama to the space with contrasting textures. Aside from being the entrance to my loft, Jerry and Roxane will eventually use this area as an office for Self-Storage management and real estate.

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El Barrio's Conduit Installed

For the last post in my critically acclaimed series featuring dirt, El Barrio finished laying conduit under the kitchen and bar. Next week, we'll be moving away from dirt, and into the exciting world of concrete slabs! [gallery order="DESC"]

Second Avenue Success Story: Downtown Resurgence

Second Avenue Success Story: Downtown Resurgence. Great news spot on CBS 42 covering our 2nd Avenue neighborhood. And they mention Artwalk and Sidewalk, so bonus points.

El Barrio's Plumbing Installed

Continuing my photographic study of dirt, last week Appleseed finished laying out the plumbing for El Barrio. The long strip in the first shot is the bar. The larger area below is the kitchen area. These pipes will feed the various sinks, dishwashers, etc needed to run a restaurant. Should finish up with electrical this week. [gallery order="DESC"]

El Barrio's Wildly Controversial Sign

I'm not very involved with El Barrio's design. I white-boxed the space, and most everything else is up to them. However, contractually I do have the right to approve or disapprove the signage. Not that I didn't trust the Trattoria guys' sense of style; I just wanted to make sure there weren't a bunch of bright lights aimed into my window. They showed me the sign design a couple of weeks ago, and I quickly nodded approval. The sign was so unobjectionable that I was surprised when I read on Jeremy Erdreich's excellent Bhamarchitect Blog (where you can see a picture of the design) that the Design Review Committee tabled the vote. The issue seemed to be that it projects over the street, despite the fact that The Metro Bar, only a half block down the street, recently hung a projecting sign. Not to mention that half a block in the other direction What's on 2nd?, Urban Standard, and Rogue Tavern all have projecting signs. Even though I wasn't really involved, I'm still feeling like the kid who got picked last for the kickball team.

Dining Table Made from Elevator Pulley Wheel

I'm getting a lot of use out of the old freight elevator gearing. Appleseed used some of them to actuate the revolving TV wall. The pulley wheel is enormous and very heavy. We kicked around several possible uses for it. One thought was to use it as a chandelier, but it's pretty heavy and I was worried that if it ever fell it would go straight through the floor and/or my head. We decided a dining room table might be a little safer. Ben welded together a table base and it will be topped with glass. You can see the result below (minus the glass).

We're going to use the elevator car itself for something, too, but I'll let you guess at what that will be until it's built and I have some pictures.

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El Barrio Begins Buildout

El Barrio began their buildout last week, and Brian has been gracious enough to let me post some progress pictures as long as I don't spoil any surprises of the decor's Wow Factor. What I'm saying is: get ready to look at some pictures of dirt. The original pine floors were removed in the bar and kitchen areas in order to replace them with safer and easier to clean concrete. The salvaged wood was kept to use for patching the dining area floor, where the wood will remain.

As in the parking deck construction, below the wooden floors was a coal by-product filler, which is the dark patches you can see in the pictures. The dark patch towards the back is the kitchen area, and the thin strip running up the side is the bar, where they will feature fresh margaritas.

In other news, last night I gave the garage door opener to my first parking customer. Welcome, Darryl! And thanks for being so patient.

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The Forge, My First Customer, and The Birmingham News

I got a partial Certificate of Occupancy last week, and I'm thrilled to announce that I'm living in my loft. I haven't had time to move any furniture in, so I'm set up somewhat camp style, sleeping on an air mattress and living out of unpacked boxes. I've posted about the lit countertops before, but being there at night allowed me to take this incredible picture that really shows off the idea of a forge:

Birmingham's background as a steel producing city inspired the molten metal look of the countertops as well as the steel cabinetry.

Not only have I moved in, but so have my first self storage customers. In fact, they liked it so much they got a second unit. Welcome John and Mabel Tingley!

In a final bit of Counts Brothers news, Operation New Birmingham brought in The Birmingham News to do an article on the building last Friday. You can read it here.

Scooby Doo Approves Rotating Wall

When I saw the plans for the revolving television, I have to admit I thought "Yeah, good luck with that, guys." When I saw the wall built and laying on it's side, 600 pounds of I-can't-lift-that, I thought "See, I was right. This isn't going to work."

As usual, I was wrong. The rotating TV wall has been installed (we're holding off putting the TV into it until I move into the loft). Although the original drive belt design was abandoned in favor of a pinion system, and a smaller gear was used for the hand crank, it works perfectly. You'd think that it would be difficult to rotate 600 lbs. but the gearing makes it almost effortless.

In its flush positions, the wall displays the TV in either the entertainment room or the kitchen. At 45 degree angles it can be viewed in the dining area, or the as-of-yet-undetermined-use area (pool table?).

In non-rotating-wall news, we passed most of the inspections yesterday. There were a couple of minor changes the fire department inspector requested, so we had to push the final inspection off until Monday afternoon. The Certificate of Occupancy is close. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

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End of the Never Ending Utility Dance

I thought I was close when we finally got the water works to show, but here we are three weeks later sitting around twiddling our thumbs waiting on Alabama Power to show up, repeatedly send out the wrong crew, and blow off appointments. But no longer! Behold, the line crew! Hoo-ray! Now it's just a matter of connecting up all the systems, and having the city inspectors out. Once we have a CO, the Trattoria Centrale guys can start their construction, I can move in, and we can start renting parking spots and storage units. Waiting on the water works and power company added a total 7 extra weeks to the project, mostly of dead time. While not a delay causing issue, I enjoyed a similarly fun encounter with Brighthouse cable. Utilities seem to have a very difficult time with multi-use buildings, especially mixed residential and commercial. Brighthouse sent their residential installer out to hook up cable internet service in my loft. The installer said that he couldn't run cable through a commercial space to get to the residential, and I would have to get the commercial installer to come out. When the commercial installer came out, he said that he couldn't install in a residential space. If it weren't for the help of a smart lady named Angela in Brighthouse's customer service department, I'd probably be having the exact same circular argument with a DSL company at this very moment.

While we've been waiting we put in the appliances. I've included a picture of the stove and hood. The counters and backsplashes are still covered for protection.

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Water Meters and Rotating Walls

We've had some delays waiting on Birmingham Water Works and Alabama Power to get out to hook up meters, but the water meters were finally installed this week. It took a while but once they got to it, I think they sent everybody; my friend Kevin Keck took a nice picture of 15 gentlemen standing around waiting to dig. Now we can finish up the connections and get ready for final inspection from the city! There will still be some trim work to be done after inspection, but I should be able to move in at that point, and start leasing storage and parking. We've got the raw space finished for El Barrio. They will start their buildout in the next couple of weeks, and I'm really excited to see what they do with it.

In order to create a separate front entrance for my loft and our storage customers, we've cut a third front door perpendicular to the street. The Appleseed guys did a great job matching the existing doors and building the new one out of wood salvaged from the building.

The frames for the loft windows were completely rebuilt. This turned out to be more difficult than anticipated. There were no standards in 1911 and the windows were all custom built, so they are all different sizes by fractions of an inch. Mike was concerned that they might not be able to open and close, but they do, so now I can hang out the window and scream at people walking down the sidewalk.

There have been a lot of incremental, if somewhat less photogenic, improvements. The elevator is installed and waiting on inspection; my mom is in a wheelchair so she'll be able to see the upstairs for the first time, soon. Pantry shelving has been installed, and I'm excited about how much space I'm going to have. I also included pictures of the master bathroom light fixtures to rectify my poor photo from last week.

The most interesting thing going on right now, Ben is building the rotating TV wall. The wall is steel, to match the kitchen cabinetry.

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SCUBA Diving Tub

The master bathroom tub, like the mud room, was inspired by one of my hobbies. Mike wanted to find a tub that "would be big enough to test SCUBA gear." I don't think this is quite big enough for both me and a tank, but its close and regardless I like the sentiment. Aside from the utility, I really like the look of this tub; the guiding concept for the loft has been putting sleek modern items next to rough, old and/or industrial features. In this case you have the tub and bold tile next to the 100 year old black brick and heart pine floors (covered up in this picture).

The light fixtures in the sink areas have been installed, so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to once again show off my photographic incompetence; don't they look great? The fixtures along with the sinks and faucets follow the same clean lines of the tub, and the cabinetry will have custom steel doors like the kitchen. Mike told me something or other about the mirrors but I don't remember what it was.

Another modern looking feature, Appleseed added "floating" shelving in the entertainment space. Simple, seemingly unsupported, white lines create a cool pattern. These shelves will house a lot of the fun historic items I found before we started construction.

Ben is currently building cabinetry for the revolving TV. Below you can see one of the old elevator gears he's cut to mount in the mechanism.

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Oh, I'm afraid the Big Ass Fan will be quite operational by the time your friends arrive

After a few tornado related delays, we're back on track to try for a Certificate of Occupancy by the end of the month. The parking deck is complete except for the concrete section below which will be El Barrio's grease traps. The rear stairs are almost finished and already looking pretty cool.

After the door hardware installation, the self-storage units themselves are complete. The security system should be finished soon. Unfortunately the freight elevator will most likely not be ready until next month.

My residence is nearing completion as well. All plumbing fixtures except the tub have been installed. The steel cabinetry is finished and the industrial feel will contrast the slick appliances, once installed.

The Big Ass Fan is installed. I took a picture of Mike standing under it, for scale. As you can see, it's big. Mike's idea for the fan was to have it peaking out halfway past the center dividing wall, to give the illusion of a giant circular saw coming towards the wooden beadboard wall.

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Resources for those suffering due to storm damage (via HCWhitney, LLC)

We have compiled a list of resources for you and/or anyone you know to use for help with storm related damage across Alabama.  If we can be of further help, please let us know. The American Red Cross web site can help you find the locations to get clean up kits, comfort kits, food, shelter, and even counseling if needed. You can Click Here to find a local chapter nearest you or your loved ones. The Salvation Army in Birmingham can help you find D … Read More

via HCWhitney, LLC

Countertops Made Out of Lava

I got this voice message: "Wade, It's Mike Gibson. Just calling to let you know the countertops are freaking awesome. Okay. That's it. Thanks. Bye." Appleseed's specialty is custom cabinetry. To keep with the industrial feel and exposed materials, they built the kitchen cabinetry out of steel rather than wood. I like to reuse as much of the building's original materials as possible so they incorporated two sturdy old wooden display tables into the base of the kitchen island. The tables were once used by the dry goods store.

I had originally wanted concrete countertops. Mike told me that if everything I used was rough, then it wouldn't look like I was doing it on purpose; it would just look rough. He said that I needed to put some nice features in to contrast the rough look. He suggested a white Alabama marble, which I just didn't like. His next suggestion was onyx. I looked around online to see some examples. Turns out, onyx is slightly translucent, so you can light it. I thought it would be cool to have a countertop that looked like glowing lava, or a forge to compliment the steel cabinetry. Ben figured out a way to run LED lights around the edge. You can see the results below, and it looks incredible.

The cabinets in the master bath are also steel. However, the guest bath has standard wooden cabinetry, but we did use onyx on top. Mike claims to have "a surprise" for the guest bath countertop, so we'll see what that is.

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The Big Fan Has Arrived

For those of you who didn't believe the name of the fan company, here is the box:

Parking Deck 2nd Floor Complete

The 2nd floor of Counts Brothers' parking deck has been poured. The rear stairs are currently under construction and the elevator is being installed. [gallery order="DESC"]