Historical Information and Restoration Progress of 120 & 124 South Winter St – Downtown Adrian, Michigan
Sphere immediately started by taking extensive drone footage, giving us a close look at the many problem areas that we needed to address.
Since most of the deterioration and damage was due to water, it made logical sense to start with the mansard roof, and ensure that everything was sealed up and preventing water from tricking down into lower façade design elements.
He began researching who would be capable of such a job that was willing to bid the mansard roof project.
After attempting to collect bids for the exterior, we found it difficult to get a contractor willing to take on such a large project. The few bids we did receive were comically large and did not make financial sense.
We decided to tackle the building one small project at a time, and do so through the help of a smaller general contractor.
On October 1, 2019, we signed a contract for services, leaving it open ended, and Kirk Valentine, owner of Sphere Project Management got to work.
On much of the trim, there were 10+ layers of paint (Green, Black, Silver, Gray, and numerous coats of white). This was most noticeable on the first floor façade trim. All underlying detail of the trim was gone.
During Adrian’s downtown boom in the 1860-1890s, most of the buildings were built with soft clay bricks made in town on the banks of the Raisin River. They are incredibly soft and delicate. The problem with painting soft brick is that moisture can get trapped in the brick, and the paint prevents it from properly evaporating. When this water inevitably freezes, it starts to cause the face of the brick to spall, permanently damaging it. Once the underlying unprotected and porous internal brick surfaces are exposed, it continues to deteriorate.
5 windows on the south face of the building were boarded or bricked over.
The previous owner appears to have attempted to repaint multiple times- – but gave up before completing each time. There are three different shades of maroon trim currently on the front of Clark Memorial Hall. The paint was flaking off and causing brick damage, most notably on the south side.
The dormer windows were boarded up at some point in the early 1980s.
At some point, someone had covered up the original built-in gutters with plywood, shingled over it, and attached cheap aluminum gutters on the edges of the Mansard roof. There was also very poorly executed rubber roofing pieces installed that had seams that were cracking and failing.
Plants were growing in the gutters.
When we purchased Clark Memorial Hall, the exterior façade was deteriorating quickly. Although at first glance things didn’t look that bad, as you got closer you started seeing all kinds of problems.