A Sow's Ear

This is our 1974 Glage doublewide when we first found it in 1998. Dirty yellow, like the neighbor’s station wagon. We steered a lot of changes through this place in twenty-three years. If you were to compare these photos to more recent ones, you would be forgiven for thinking they are two different houses. When remodeling began, the most frequent comment was: "But it won't look like a trailer any more!"

Here is what the east and north sides looked like. This was the true front of the house but no one ever used it. So the indented door was sided over and the porch door became the main entrance. The deck was ripped off and the old ranch style windows and awnings were replaced with the biggest windows I could squeeze in there. Then it all got trimmed out, painted up and we were on our way.

The landscaping at this point wasn't too bad. I was told that the first owner started with white sand, pristine until the neighborhood kids discovered it. He put in gravel. Directly east is the clubhouse with sixty steps to the swimming pool. Directly north is the neighbor, just one pick-up truck's width away + exhaust. I planted a hedge.

If you look up the term ‘trailer trash’ in Webster’s Dictionary you will find a picture of our porch after we moved in. That was us all right. But Trashe. With an e. Believe it or not, by the time we put the house back on the market, that porch had become the most elegant room in the house. Presentation is everything!

The common entrance to our house, the one we used 100% of the time, was through the carport and into the laundry. They say real friends always use the back door. True enough. Also true: this guy was young. I guess we're old now because neither one of us can remember adding rises to those steps. Ditching the brown felt, yes.

This is the living room before we got rid of the door, the built-in bookcase and the crispy crunchy wall-to-wall carpeting. If you touched the drapes they fell apart. That thing on the ceiling is where the two halves of the house are joined together. In mobile home speak it's called 'the marriage line.' Forever hold your pieces.

Here's the heart of the house, the kitchen, open to the dining room on one end and the living room on the other. So much woodgrain. Every square inch. And they called this the ‘light’ variety. I must say the saloon doors were a special touch.

This is a fine view of the fine dining room (or bedroom if you have three families) with a glimpse of the kitchen and the screened porch. Now I ask, who would not pair a crystal chandelier with plastic florescence? And the lovely linoleum. No one would touch it without wearing a hazmat suit. So we layered over it.

At the west end of the house is the master bedroom with its foot-wide clerestory windows, good for fighting off invaders without having to pull on your chainmail. As you can see, the paneling refuses to surrender. Every square inch got painted with a two-inch brush. My back is still in retreat.

Last but not least, the pièce de résistance, the only reason we considered buying this house (major snark) is the master bathroom. Actually it was the first to go. And yes, that is more paneling, this time with white grooves.

Click on all the images to see them in detail.