I am helping out a local homeowner here in Terrell do some work on his house. He owns the oldest house in Kaufman County, built in the late 1840's. It is home to the only existing indoor water well in Texas. Anyway, he wants to open it as a museum and the historic sign they erected back in the 1930's needed some help, so we reset the post and I took the upper half and brought it home to redo. Nothing was salvageable but the sign itself so out came a few old cedar deck boards to be sanded and glued for a substrate.
Then I mounted the sign and made a border with a dado for the sign and substrate. A 'shelf' was built under and over the sign and then an art-deco inspired top was made. On the original sign there were balusters on each side so I made some new ones. All out of cedar and it was looking great. The homeowner changed out the balusters to a more rounded style [like you find on stairs] which changed the look completely.
It was a fun project nonetheless and the sign will be back up on the post soon. I didn't charge him a cent even though it took me 12 hours over two days. I am volunteering my time to learn about the old house until he gets funded...at that time he has agreed that we will become the official restoration crew for the house as we transition it to a museum.
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