This little house has a wooden sign on its gable end, declaring 'Casa Del Sol' in looping blue cursive, hand cut from plywood. There was a big sun on the end of the house too, but that has gone. The name sign appears to have been there for some time, and I guess was installed when the owner painted some clogs blue and screwed them to the wall, and painted the fence blue and white. It's all quite nutty.
Even nuttier, some might say, is my attempt to salvage the sign. As I've said before, there's not a lot that's worth saving in this house. We'll let Habitat for Humanity, or anyone who wants to, strip the house for parts, and we'll give away the plants. But there's really nothing we want to keep - except maybe this sign. Casa Del Sol is a (hyper-)local landmark, and the sign is redolent of old Hermosa and says something about the family who bought this house in the 1940s when it was brand new, and occupied it for 70 years.
So I lobbied to somehow keep the sign. I plan to use it in the new house, in a respectful tip of the hat to the house we, um, are tearing down. I thought if I nail it to a board and tidy it up a bit, it could make a fun 'bar' sign for the roof deck, or a board for towel hooks by the outdoor shower. It'll be kitsch, but in a meaningful way.
My plan met with some scepticism. It's a silly name for a house, and it's a tatty, broken up thing. But once I'd outlined my vision, the family got on board. Let's hope that trend continues.
And now we are the proud owners of a fun new set of shower hooks: the only scrap of the old house that will be visible in the new build.
Even nuttier, some might say, is my attempt to salvage the sign. As I've said before, there's not a lot that's worth saving in this house. We'll let Habitat for Humanity, or anyone who wants to, strip the house for parts, and we'll give away the plants. But there's really nothing we want to keep - except maybe this sign. Casa Del Sol is a (hyper-)local landmark, and the sign is redolent of old Hermosa and says something about the family who bought this house in the 1940s when it was brand new, and occupied it for 70 years.
So I lobbied to somehow keep the sign. I plan to use it in the new house, in a respectful tip of the hat to the house we, um, are tearing down. I thought if I nail it to a board and tidy it up a bit, it could make a fun 'bar' sign for the roof deck, or a board for towel hooks by the outdoor shower. It'll be kitsch, but in a meaningful way.
My plan met with some scepticism. It's a silly name for a house, and it's a tatty, broken up thing. But once I'd outlined my vision, the family got on board. Let's hope that trend continues.
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