The Perfect Move In

Our firm was hired in mid February, 2012,  by a client who had purchased a New Canaan home with brought me to the 1990s home with these words, "I'd like to change this bride's staircase (double staircase), the columns in the living room and have a new kitchen."  Though we are an interiors design firm, our 22 year history in high end historic renovations inevitably brings us working closely with the architect and builder, typically making for a close knit team.  From a staircase and column concern, this 10,000+ square foot house ended up having every room in the house touched in architecture, floor plan, or finishes.  It wasn't a minor little update, it was a full blown renovation.

To be honest, a project like this is every bit a three year project from the architectural planning to the furnishings installation.   That said, we were given a mandate that the client would celebrate the holidays in the renovated home.  December 18 was our target date and that was that.

The past week is a near blur that reminds me of final exams at Kellogg.  The days blend together and the mind is working on multi dimensional multiple tracks.  The painters are painting around us, finish carpenters are installing hardware, the specialty finishes painter is literally running tandem teams for 23 hour work days, the moving company is high tailing it from our Long Island City workroom to the metal refinishers in Stamford, with a million (well not maybe that many) stops in between and there is  whir of sawing as there is a mad dash to install a belgium block driveway.

Yesterday, the fifth day of the furnishings installation, the corner has been turned.  Furniture is placed, we have spent hours arranging bookcases, moving accessories,  rethinking a piece here or there and taking stock of what is still needed.  No one has lost their temper.  Everyone has been in convivial.  There have been fifty people a day working shoulder to shoulder.  Our biggest challenge has been how to park all of us, and I am sad to report that I am the first one to have christened the owner's stone pillars with the side of my car.

How do you survive the week of move in?  And in particular one of this magnitude?  It's pretty simple really:
1.  Show appreciation.  It is seen in your words and your body language.  It takes a minute to recognize work being well done.
2.   As the contractor on this job says, "There is no "I" in Team."   Take a minute and ask how a co-worker is.  And actually care about what the response is.

Bust of Apollo overlooks the entry.  Bust: early 20th c.  Mouth adornment: Friday afternoon

3.  Keep your sense of humor.  See photo above (hey, who said there were smoking breaks?).
4.  Have an extra measuring tape handy that you can loan out (I never mastered this one but I sure appreciate all the times I was loaned one).
5.  Pay the people working for you in a timely manner.  It's important to them and the right thing to do.

Analyzing how to hang a plaster ceiling medallion out the second story archway

6.  Let people know you appreciate the job that they are doing.  Oh, did I say that already? Above, is Robert, the phenomenal specialty painter who turned an oval entry into a stoned rotunda and Bob, the on site construction manager.  I never saw him lose his cool-- not once.

And one quick commercial announcement:  Thank You Joe Fossi and Pelham Homes LLC with all of their subcontractors, Robert Weinstein et al, Joe Shea and his team, Stephen Gamble Refinishers, Stephanie Paci and her organizers, Marta Cuprys, Maritza Rodriquez and their workers, Morgan Manhatten Movers, Liz Miller,  Ellsworth Ford's invaluable Project Manager and Carlene Safdie, design partner.  There could not have been a better team this week.