When we took on a client with an origin as historically significant to The Houston area as the Thomas Albert Sinclair House (also known as Burge House), we knew that our restoration of such a Landmark needed to be absolutely impeccable. Thankfully, our team was more than up for the challenge! Read on for a behind the scenes look at this restoration.
A Little History on the Home
Thomas Albert Sinclair, as one of the original founders and president of Heights Hospital, made a considerable impact on the Houston area community. His spectacular former home, which is nestled in the heart of the Heights, is a historic and beloved Houston Landmark. Built in 1910, the home originally belonged to another prominent Houstonian, Robert A. Burge, and was later sold to Thomas Sinclair. Through the years it has been a private home at times and housed local business offices at others. Today, it serves as a private residence.
Interesting Facts:
The home was originally purchased in 1910 for $2000! (That's equivalent to $55,500 today!)
The Houston Heights was one of the first planned suburbs in Texas.
In 1998 the home was officially recognized as a Landmark of The City of Houston.
Taking on a Restoration
Though it’s not without its own challenges, in a routine home renovation you can expect that material options will, generally speaking, be plentiful and widely available. This makes for a fairly streamlined process.
On the other hand, a restoration is anything but routine. The ideal situation is, of course, to stay true to the original design of the home and to restore as many original features as possible. The older the home, the bigger the challenge, as older resources are harder to come by. Pulling off the restoration on the Thomas Albert Sinclair Home was definitely an exciting challenge for us.
The Hunt for Long Leaf Red Pine
The main challenge we came up against in this restoration was in finding that some of the original flooring was damaged and needed replacement. In a home this age, that's not completely unexpected but as I'm sure you can imagine, finding matching flooring for a 100 year old house is not easy. What added to the difficulty was that the flooring was made up of Long Leaf Red Pine - a once plentiful, but now scarce tree, whose popularity and ready availability led to it being harvested to near extinction. Thus, our diligent search for Long Leaf Red Pine flooring began!
Interesting Facts:
The soft wood of the Long Leaf Red Pine was actually originally a sub floor intended to be covered up by carpet or linoleum. Over time, the sap in the wood hardened, making the floors hard and suitable to be refinished as a main floor.
The Longleaf Pine is still endangered today, however efforts are being made to repopulate the species.
Longleaf Pines are pyrophytic, meaning they are naturally resistant to wildfire.
Finding A Match
Thankfully, the stars aligned and our hunt ended when we got in contact with a reclamation company who had just what we were looking for. Over in Schulenburg, Texas sat a century old barn made up of, you guessed it - Long Leaf Red Pine! The barn, no longer useful in its life as shelter or storage, was destined for demolition. Luckily for us it was carefully dismantled, and the Long Leaf Red Pine was set aside for a new life.
Piecing It All Together
Once we got a hold of the reclaimed wood our team got right to work piecing it together. The original floors and reclaimed wood were seamlessly blended, expertly sanded and buffed, and finally finished off with a rich stain.
From Start to Finish: Photos of Our Flooring Restoration Process!
Beautifully Restored
We were ecstatic with the end result of this flooring restoration and are extremely proud to have been trusted with such an important piece of Houston's history. We look forward to the next restoration project!
- Floor Revue
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