Room with an 'Ewwww'

Now that it's time to renovate the last upstairs room, our 'library.' Amazingly, I've realized that I'm actually confident in what I'm doing. A year ago, I couldn't have imagined tackling such a task with aplomb, but now I'm simply concerned about how much time it will take - rather than wondering how I'm going to tackle it.

Of course, very little of it would be necessary if some of the previous owners had remodeled to work with the house, rather than against it - not to mention the slapdash behavior they seem to have exhibited. Let's take the room I'm tackling now, for example. They painted the built-in desk after they installed it and didn't bother putting down protection to keep the paint off the hardwood floor. They put cork boards on the wall and proceeded to infuse them with cigarette smoke that's lingered strongly for years. They covered the walls (and ceiling) with popcorn texture that's so sharp and rough that it's easy to scrape your hand simply by walking past it. They removed the original baseboards and replaced them with smaller, cheaper ones that leave visible gaps between the floor and the wall. They even painted the antique doors white. If I had any hair left, I'd be tearing it out.

Thus, my current project. The original plan was:

1) Removing the built-in

2) Scraping the cork/carpet squares off the western (window) wall

3) Scraping the popcorn texture off the remaining walls and ceiling

4) Painting the west wall with paint designed to cover smoke damage

5) Skim coating the west wall (two coats, plus sanding)

6) Stripping and refinishing the doors and window frame

7) Painting the walls and ceiling

8) Replacing the baseboards (buying, cutting, staining)

9) Lining the west wall with bookshelves

I started five days ago, on Monday evening, and so far I'm about halfway through Step 5. Unfortunately, I had to make some modifications. Step 3 disappeared completely, since the texture in this room is, strangely, much more solid and harder to scrape off than in the yellow room. Since I couldn't scrape off the texture without gouging up the wall - meaning I'd have to skim coat it anyway - I decided to just skim coat the whole room. I also decided to paint the entire room with the odor-blocking paint, just in case.

Here are some photos of the work in progress:

Before we moved in. Looks are deceiving. Smells are not.

Just after we moved in.

Underneath the carpet - easily cleaned to reveal beautiful hardwood.

Starting to demolish the built-in.

It's gone!

What lies beneath.

Painted, and just starting to skim coat.

So far, I've gotten three walls skim coated, with one more to go. Then it'll be time for some minor sanding and knocking off the high bits, and hopefully only one more coat of skim. Then it's on to Step 6!

Yay.