All of the wood used in the shelves and trim in this four-walled, floor-to-ceiling library were milled from a single standing dead ash tree. (The emerald ash borer has killed most ash trees in southeast Michigan, making ash a kind of “recycled” wood.) Pieces with interesting grain, knots, holes, or borer-marks were saved for the more visible parts of the shelves.

The reinforcing beams were salvaged from an old barn – and, somewhat miraculously, fit right in place without needing to be cut.

The floor is maple that had been reclaimed from a shoe factory.  Certain pieces had darkened from the oil of machines placed nearby, and other pieces were partially painted or worn from traffic. Instead of sanding it all down and refinishing it, we patterned all of the light and dark pieces together.

The wood door to the side porch (as well as two other doors in the house) came from a school in Terre Haute, Indiana.

The sliding step-stool still has an index card taped to its inside that says, appropriately, “Chicago Public Library.”

Furniture and fixtures: salvaged / Skylights: secondhand / Windows: new, low-E, Energy-Star / Building materials: 40% salvaged

This room was originally separated from the dining room by a wall. We removed that wall and moved another to make enough space to wrap the counter around under the East window and to open the kitchen up to the dining room towards the West, creating a corridor with large windows at either end and a skylight-well in the center of each room.

With the exception of the refrigerator, all of the appliances in this kitchen came secondhand from Craigslist. (Everything and the kitchen sink!)

The backsplash that expands into a custom mosaic over the cooktop consists of a pairing of one-of-a-kind saltillo-like tiles that were being discarded from a ceramic artist with everyday, machine-made brown quarry tile remnants.

The custom potrack was made with leftover walnut pieces from the window trim. Screwed into the studs above, it can support the weight of even the heaviest cast-iron pans.

Cabinet doors: local recycled ash, stained and sealed with Danish oil / Floor: concrete, hand-troweled / Counters: concrete, cast off-site to custom dimensions / Window trim: reclaimed urban walnut / Furniture and fixtures: salvaged, secondhand / Windows: new / Baseboards: recycled ash wood / Building materials: 50% salvaged

There was originally a wall separating this bedroom from a small 6-foot-square closet at the end of the hallway. We removed the wall and closet door to create a small sitting room with built-in shelves and large, South-facing casement windows.

The transformation of what could have been a dedicated closet into a small room with a built-in shelf created a storage problem that was solved by the use of two smaller shelves, two large wardrobes (one antique, one modern), four vintage, hot-pink “Jersey Fruit” peach crates, a couple vintage trunks, and several sizes of finished particle-board and plexiglass display cubes from an outdated Victoria’s Secret showroom installation.

Floor: cork tile / Window trim and library detail: salvaged urban walnut / Door: salvaged / Door hardware: original to house / Furniture and fixtures: salvaged, secondhand, heirloom / Décor: salvaged / Baseboards: salvaged onsite / Building materials: 60% salvaged

This room was originally separated from the kitchen by a wall. We removed that wall to open up the space and created a corridor with large windows at either end and a skylight-well in the center of each room.

The dining room floor is the kind of Vermont slate often found in the foyers of mid-century Midwestern homes – although typically there are some deep red or burgundy accent tiles included in the repeating pattern. Most of these came from a bin that a local remodeler had dropped off at the local salvage warehouse. We removed the red tiles from our installation and added tiles from two other sources – salvaged and secondhand – to get enough tiles to complete the pattern in our desired color scheme.

The thresholds leading to the adjoining kitchen and library were made from reclaimed urban walnut.

Floor: reclaimed, salvaged, secondhand / Sliding door: secondhand / Trim: original, salvaged / Furniture and fixtures: salvaged / Decor: salvaged / Building materials: 70% salvaged

This bathroom had four layers of old flooring, including a top layer of carpet (carpet – in a bathroom!) that had to be removed before we could lay the tile. The layout was changed to make room for a vintage Kohler avocado green bathroom set.

The “post-faux” vanity was found in a neighbor’s garage – a dusty old antique piece that had been refinished in a faux-antique style years ago, then naturally distressed for a second time after years of neglect sitting in a garage. We kept it in that state and simply coated the top – thereby sealing in the layers of chipped paint from all its past lives. Then it was altered to accommodate the twin sinks and plumbing, while still retaining two drawers of usable storage space.

The upper surround of the shower was tiled with salvaged and secondhand remnants of dozens of different tile jobs, incorporating tiles of many different sizes, thicknesses, shades of white, textures, and finishes to make a geometric, Mondrian-style custom mosaic.

The shower and window sills are custom-cut remnants (leftovers from a big kitchen job) from a local granite contractor. The window trim is composed of pieces of Italian marble tile salvaged from a local building before demolition.

The south wall features a large, antique, “reverse-blueprint”-style railroad map of the city of Detroit, mounted on moisture-resistant foamboard.

Floor: retro hex tile, new / Tub, toilet, and sinks: secondhand / Windows: new / Vanity and shelf: salvaged / Mirrors: salvaged and secondhand / Railroad map: salvaged / Baseboards: salvaged onsite/ Other fixtures: salvaged / Building materials: 60% salvaged

The floor is the original wide-plank pine floor, repaired, sanded down, stained, and sealed to keep the history embedded in some of its deeper gouges.

The double doors leading to the adjacent room were originally sidelights (windows on the sides of doors) from a nunnery in Monroe, Michigan. We cleaned, stained, and sealed them to reveal original antique leadwork and beautiful wood grain under years of soot, grime, and water damage. The matching door to the hallway is from the same source.

The antique secretary and floral brass table lamp also cleaned up nicely after having been found in two different garages, covered in years of dirt and dust. The secretary has a

The coatrack is a repurposed Hollywood stage light that has “Chrysler” (probably from the local theater) printed on its side.

The large painting depicting an abstract soldier’s head hovering over a war-ravaged landcape was rescued from the abandoned Artillery Armory on 8 Mile Road before the Armory was demolished. It was probably painted by one of the National Guardsmen stationed there.

The vintage dishes in the cabinet were castoffs from what used to be just the Boys Club of Detroit, who needed new branded dishes once their name included “Boys and Girls.”

The thresholds leading to the adjoining library and kitchen were made from reclaimed urban walnut.

Sliding glass door: secondhand / Sconces: secondhand / Door and window trim: salvaged from onsite / Furniture: salvaged / Building materials: 50% salvaged

This retaining wall’s 7.5 tons of concrete – or “urbanite”, as recycled concrete is sometimes called – is 100% reclaimed from local sidewalks. In 2009, the City of Ann Arbor began requiring residents to replace damaged sidewalks on their properties, which led to an abundance of this material at the local concrete yard. Since sidewalk concrete is generally poured to a uniform thickness, it makes good material for stacking if you have enough of it.

All except the top course of these concrete pieces were dry-stacked, without mortar, in the manner of a traditional Old World rockwall. As with real stones, installation is a laborious yet artfully meditative process of selecting just the right pieces for each spot in the wall.

The thickest, bottom-most course is completely under ground level, and many large pieces throughout the wall actually reach deep into the hill (deeper than the topmost course would suggest) for added structural integrity.  An equal volume of earth was first removed in order to make space for the wall and then returned as backfill behind a gravel drainage layer.

[more images coming soon]

The stipulation that there be a full-sized bed on the West wall of this small room made it difficult to find other pieces that could fit. But with a flexible eclecticism and a limited color scheme, we managed to turn it into a striking yet functional guest bedroom, complete with dresser, desk, mirrors, bedstand, cubbies, ottoman, that could be easily converted into a children’s room in the future.

Bed: supplied by client / Overhead light and fan: existing / Wall paint color: existing / Dresser: salvaged / Chair and ottoman: salvaged / Floor and table lamps: salvaged / Wall hangings: series of drawings by local artist, salvaged / Cubbies: salvaged / Desk and bedstand: heirloom