The Magnificent Seven

Seven. That's right, Seven. That's how many workers were beavering away on the building site today. It's a record. Dieter Edinger and his three co-workers were plastering like demons. Big areas are definitely easier for them, as they completed a full gable and the front of the house today. I think these walls are more or less ready for painting, which is another story. We have to pick colours for the timberwork (probably a very dark brown) and something to complement that for the plasterwork (probably an off-white like Altweiss), so there's some testing to be done.

On with the pictures, which describe what was done today better than I can.

Yesterday.

This afternoon.

This evening.

From the front.

The sandstone frames are looking distinctly grubby now, compared to all that shiny new plaster. They need a little work, and then they'll be painted a sandstone colour. I'd considered sandblasting them and leaving them natural, but they are in various states of disrepair, with patchy colours, and in some cases badly worn, so a bit of paint might help protect them.

On the west gable are several iron anchors, binding the wall to the large oak beams spanning the width of the house. As an architectural, as well as structural feature, I'll clean them up and paint them for contrast.

Meanwhile, out back, the Kispert people (that means the three guys that work for Kispert, the general builder) were staging what looked like trench warfare, digging ditches for pipes. They also installed the drainage along the back wall, part of the perimeter insulation, and a lot of work connecting a pipe for the drainage into the sewers.

The "dodgy" corner

The trenches pictured below lead to the pigsty. We're not doing anything there for quite some time, but perhaps in a few years we'll need water and electricity over there. We'll lay empty pipes to connect to the sewers (the trench on the left) and one leading from the house to take fresh water and electricity cables (the trench running bottom right to top left).

Trenches!

Some day we might have the Dirty Dozen!