Rebuilding our Ballroom Wall
One of our organization’s core values is Holistic Education. This means that we include an educational component in every aspect of our work. We believe in inquiry-based education that nurtures human relationships and fosters both the cognitive and creative sides of the human psyche. Continue reading to see how we’ve put this value into practice with our ballroom wall rebuild project!
Introducing the Project
Willowbank student Julia Hodgson participates in the Ballroom wall rebuild project
Over the past few months, we have successfully rebuilt the entrance wall into the Ballroom on the second floor of the John Brown House. This project was important to our team, emphasizing the significance of traditional craftsmanship while providing a tangible link to the John Brown House’s architectural origins. It also brings us one step closer to completing the home’s full restoration.
With the help of second-year students from the Willowbank School of Restoration Arts, led by their instructor, Heritage Carpenter Doug Vickers, the wall was rebuilt using traditional methods. A few weeks later, we completed the second half of the project by applying a traditional three-coat plaster. We wanted to share a little bit about the project here today, and have created two separate step-by-step videos showing the entire process from start to finish.
Justifying the Project
Rebuilding the entrance wall was just one step within our larger Ballroom restoration project. When we purchased the site in 2015, this was one of the rooms in the house that had been left relatively untouched since the 1970s. We plan on adaptively restoring this room into a more versatile, accessible event space - just like it had been originally! After all, in order for this place to remain preserved, it needs to have a purpose. There needs to be a reason for people to visit, to engage with the space, and to want to return.
In order to open up the room so that we can host larger groups of people, we needed to make two major changes to the layout: remove the partition wall, and rebuild the entrance wall. As you can see in the Part 1 video above, we documented the 25 layers of wallpaper, and the partition wall that had likely been added by the Chellew family around the 1860s was carefully removed in three separate parts. The Chellews were the second family to live here, after the last generation of the Brown family sold the property in 1858. The Chellews had 11 children and probably added the wall in order to create more bedrooms for the kids. Don’t worry - we placed the partition wall pieces in storage and will re-erect it elsewhere as part of our future interpretation of this site.
The new layer of plaster and gypsum board against the wooden studs, constructed in the 1980s.
Then it was time to tackle the entrance wall. Originally, when this part of the house was built around 1802-1804, this wall would have been constructed the same way as the walls in the rest of the house. There would have been large studs nailed in place, covered by accordion lath, and then a plaster coat. Accordion lath is made by drying and stretching thin planks of wood, strategically applying hatchet splits and pulling the board apart far enough to create gaps for plaster to settle into.
When we purchased the home in 2015, we noticed that this section of the wall had been taken out by one of the families living here over the past 230+ years. The home’s previous owner rebuilt the wall in the 1980s, using gypsum board and a single, thick coat of plaster. You can see what we mean in the photo here. Because the wall was a fairly modern construction, we were comfortable removing it and rebuilding it in a style that would have initially been employed.
Significance of the Project
Our entire organization is founded on the principles of heritage conservation, education, and community-building. We believe that historic sites reach their full potential when they are vibrant community spaces that nurture a growing passion for learning. With these principles in mind, we saw this construction project as the perfect opportunity for both teaching, and community engagement. Most significantly, the Willowbank students were given the chance to learn about historical building methods within our local Niagara context, and participate in hands-on learning from start to finish. At the same time, we recorded our progress and converted the footage into a video format so that this valuable information from the minds of talented craftsmen like Doug Vickers can be available to the public.
Mackenzie explains the process to our volunteer plasterers
During the plaster process, members of our staff and a few lucky drop-in visitors were given the opportunity to apply sections of the scratch coat, under plasterer Madison Vendittelli’s supervision. Our staff learned a lot throughout this process, undergoing careful research, conversing with colleagues in the heritage trades, and collaborating with one another. Madison’s determination to get the job done properly, his general positive attitude, and amusing anecdotes strengthened our camaraderie as we tackled this new and exciting project together.
For Mackenzie Campbell, a valued member of our team and the lead on this wall rebuild project, the significance was in her personal growth as she led the process from start to finish. Her attitude towards heritage conservation as a Willowbank graduate brought a coherent, professional perspective to this project as she thoughtfully planned and executed each task.
If you haven’t yet, be sure to check out the videos! If this topic piqued your interest, please share it with your friends and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more restoration content. As always, thanks for watching!