Pitching a tent. On the roof!

Cold weather became even colder weather in February. The synthetic roofing tiles were too brittle to cut. And it was just too cold for the roofers to work on the roof without gloves.

The sky was that beautiful blue that only happens on the coldest days of winter. Almost too blue to believe.

And the roofers came up with a solution that allowed them to keep working. They pitched an ice-fishing tent on the flat roof of one of the additions and plugged in a heater. This allowed them to work without gloves. And to heat the tiles so they weren’t too brittle to cut. Brilliant!

By the end of the month, the last bits of flashing had gone up, and nearly the entire mansard roof was done!

And back in the shop, the custom dormer brackets were being milled. Those will be the last elements to go back. The carpenters will work with the roofers to flash and install the brackets on each side of the ten dormer windows, after their primed in the shop. But first, each bracket requires several different pieces to make all of the decorative flourishes found in the originals.