Turret House – bashing Victorian pediments

Quick post today! I’ll have a bigger one soon about the trim I’ve been working on for weeks, but first I want to revisit the brackets and window pediments I left off with last time.

In order to make this window pediment fit under the bracket, I initially tried cutting the corner off both parts of the pediment.

This worked, but I thought I could do better. I tried again, this time cutting the peaked part and the flat part separately. I only cut off a small part of the corner on the flat part, and then sanded a groove in the top to allow the bracket to slide in over it.

I realized once I saw it in place that the corner of the bottom part didn’t need to be removed at all, so I gave it a third try. We have a winner!

I did this by cutting and sanding the back corner of the pediment, leaving the front corner intact. I’m able to slide the window in under the bracket, and then set the peaked pediment on top.

The whole time I was working on the brackets, I didn’t have any windows in the turret. When I put the windows in I realized the bracket gets in the way of one of them. Ooops.

My pediment trick doesn’t work here since the turret needs to be able to swing open and closed under the bracket, as opposed to the other side where I can put in the pieces in a specific order and then leave them that way. So for this one I’ll use my rejected first attempt. Because you don’t see this window head-on when you look at the house, I don’t care that so much of the corner is missing.

At this point I was down one window from failed attempt #2, plus I needed two to replace two plain windows that came with the house. (Those were supposed to be for the gables, but I decided to use Victorian windows there instead.) I knew I had some in my stash, but when I pulled them out I realized they’re not exactly the same.

The house came with the older style Victorian window (on the left). Besides the wood being a different color, you can tell the difference because the older ones come in yellow boxes and the newer ones in cellophane packaging.

They fit in the same size opening, but the exterior trim on the newer windows is longer. The new ones also have a different way of holding in the plexiglass and have a sash piece on the inside as well as the outside. I’m planning to add sash pieces to the insides of my windows, so that wasn’t a problem, but the size difference is a deal-breaker if you have old and new windows next to each other.

I could have used three newer windows on the side panels, where they wouldn’t be right next to old windows, but in the interest of consistency I decided to check eBay for the older style. I came across an auction for a bunch of the old boxed windows, as well as a Victorian door. (The seller was Madtex1967 from the Greenleaf Forum — hi Matt!)

The house came with all the windows but no back door. I’d planned to use a plain door there, but since all the other windows and the front door are the Victorian style, I decided to use the Victorian door from eBay on the back.

My Fairfield has this door and I’ve never liked the transom. The plexiglass is glued in, so you can’t paint the back side of the wood. This isn’t a problem in the Fairfield since you can’t see it from that angle, but you would be able to in the Turret House. It also seems too ornate for the back door.

My Gull Bay came with a Victorian door that had been modified to remove the transom. I like this look better. (I also swapped out the door itself — you can read about that here and here.)

So I used my utility knife to cut off the top portion, removed the unnecessary pieces, and put it back together.

It is still a little fancy for a back door, but it pleases me that everything matches now.

That’s all for today, but stay tuned for the big trim post!