Preservation or Restoration?

Preservation of an old house entails keeping as much of the original “fabric” as possible. Restoration of an old house entails replacing the “broken” bits of a house so that it still functions as a house.  How much restoration is too much?  

There’s an old joke about the carpenter who has been using the same hammer for 50 years. He’s replaced the handle four times and the steel head twice, and it’s still going strong. As we can see, the carpenter hasn’t been using the “same” hammer for 50 years, as any original part of the hammer was long ago replaced with new parts. When one undertakes historic restoration of a house, one must be careful to not make the same mistake. There are wooden temples in Japan that have been standing for over 1,000 years. How is that possible? Why aren’t these old wood temples all rotten? Well, every 20 years or so they are completely taken apart and rebuilt exactly the same with mostly new wood and this has been occurring for the entire 1,000 years. So actually the 1,000-year-old temple is really only about 20 years old at any given time. But this is okay. If this wasn’t done, the temples would have disappeared centuries ago. The function of the building is a structure to worship in, not a building to be worshiped. So, what happens if it's the building you revere? Then you wish to keep as much of the original parts as possible. If you wanted to preserve a wood temple you would need to build a building around it to keep it out of the elements.  

Fortunately, with a historic house like the Heurich House, this process can be somewhat simpler.  Restoring parts of the “envelope” will preserve the house - the key is to keep the weather outside and the inside stable. Keeping water out is the number one priority. Roofs will need to be replaced periodically, there’s no way around this; they can be replaced with the same type of material as the original. The mortar in the stone and brick will need to be redone periodically, but doing so will save the original stone and brick. Same goes for the wood windows.  Doing these kinds of projects will preserve the original ceiling canvasses and the ornate wood trim. 

The Heurich House has a fortunate lineage that has helped preserve the interior. The family kept the interior largely intact as it was originally built. When Christian and Amelia died, the house was given to the DC Historical Society and they largely preserved the interior as it was when it was given to them. We do not need to pull off layers of wallpaper or paint to get to the “original fabric.” That is a rare find of a house this age. There are scars that show the age of the house and tell stories of water leaks and added fire escapes and elevators. But we have kept these to show a house in use.  There is something about walking into the Heurich House that transports you back in time, all the character and charm left intact. There is no way to travel back in time but that doesn’t mean time machines don’t exist. Come and explore the Heurich House time machine and imagine the past.