2021 Alumni Work Parties
Since January, several alumni have organized trips to 226 East Beaver Ave. to work on various maintenance and improvement projects. We are proud of the results so far, and are thrilled by the interest that this effort has generated in the alumni community — not just from those who have donated their time to come to the house, but also from those alumni-at-large who have expressed their support for this work through Facebook and other channels. Please see below for some pictures so far. There is a lot more to do, so please keep sending your well-wishes!
Room 28 is being transformed into a “Group Study Area,” intended to supplement the existing Study Room (room 27) with amenities to make it a collaborative space. A new coat of paint, refreshed ceiling tiles, and bright ceiling-mount fixtures have already made the room more inviting. The concrete floor turned out (surprisingly) well after a few passes with the linoleum stripper and concrete grinder, followed by a few coats of sealant.
Just like Room 28, we decided to strip the outdated linoleum flooring (see Br. John Decker hard at work with the machine) to give the room a more modern look. We have painted the floor and walls — without harming the Delta-T! — and a future work party will see the ceiling tiles replaced.
Pardon the mess — Room 25 is serving as the “staging area” for a lot of the other construction occurring on the second floor. The blue paint was certainly unique, but was degraded enough that we figured it best to start fresh. Just like room 25, the ceiling tiles will be part of our subsequent work party.
The wax protecting these tiles broke down long ago, leaving the 2nd floor bathroom looking like this. Our summer priority is going to be redoing the floors in the 2nd floor bathroom, to make it fit for human consumption. You can see that we have our work cut out for us, with layers of tile and linoleum to unearth and replace.
The future may see a full rip-and-replace of the shower stalls, but things already look much better with the help of the power-washer, CLR, and elbow grease.
The boxes hold thousands of sheets of tissue paper, used for pomping Homecoming floats. In addition to organizing those, we upgraded the Internet router to make better use of the house’s gigabit service and to realize faster Speedtest results. A future work party will involve a Wifi site survey in the hopes of improving coverage throughout the rooms.
We enjoyed hanging out by the fireplace during the winter work parties. Meanwhile, we spent a bit of time (and mortar) to reattach a missing brick by the stairway. Future work parties may involve replacing the metal grate and flue equipment in and around the fireplace. We will try to lean on alumni with access to metalworking and fabrication equipment to do these things.
In addition to the main projects shown above, there are plenty of smaller items that we’ve done during the past few months. Upper-left: The “Rack” room (37) needed to be sanitized with bleach and cleaned out. It looks (and smells!) much better now. Upper-right: Room 31 had some water damage which was addressed. Lower-left: In the interest of stocking the new Study Areas (room 28, and possible renovations to 27), we bought some chairs and other miscellaneous items from Lion Surplus. Lower-right: If you live in a house made of concrete, you can powerwash inside!