The Storefront Nears Completion (of Killing Me) –
The last few weeks have been a death march of painting, trim and general freaking out to get the Lost Art Press storefront ready for the March 12 opening and book-release party.
This week I hope to share details of some of the cool stuff we have in store (literally) for the opening: a special store-only T-shirt, stickers, a poster that just arrived on my doorstep today and the copperplate prints from Briony-Morrow Cribbs from “The Anarchist’s Design Book.”
Oh, and my daughter Katy is launching her own line of soft wax under the name “The Anarchist’s Daughter.”
Some of these items will make it onto the LAP website; but some are too nichey, weird or in tiny quantities. Some are experiments that will fail.
For those of you who want to crap on my finish carpentry skills, I offer these photos. Installing the casing was easy with a nail gun. But the baseboard has been making me hate bricks.
Our building is a rare example of North American masonry construction. No studs. So installing the baseboard has been tricky. Typical masonry construction has “wooden bricks” every 24″ or so to allow you to install baseboard. But because of the plaster restoration and a variety of other complications, I’ve located only about a dozen wooden bricks.
So the baseboard has been installed with a combination of long finish nails, Tapcon screws and construction adhesive. It’s a laborious process to do well on plaster walls that wave like your grandma.
Luckily my eyesight gets worse every year, so it will look fine (to me).
— Christopher Schwarz
P.S. Special thanks to Megan Fitzpatrick who painted the interior facade white and gray during the weekend. Friends are good things to have.
