Legacy Project
This is the story of the mirror on the back porch here at 173. Now, this isn't one of those great stories. It's not War and Peace, or Dr. Zhivago, or even Forest Gump. It's just the story of an old, inherited cabinet door that became the mirror on the back porch, that we sometimes just don't even notice!
The Idea
Back in 2011 we decided to remodel the back porch. Now, when I say remodel, I mean stripping 85 year's worth of paint right down to the bare wood. Here's the wall that the mirror ended up on:
And this is about 3/4 through the project. By this point we had already replaced the windows, put in the new ceiling and put the first coat of paint on the walls. I don't always feel like there should be something on every wall, but this wall was really empty.
Behavior is the mirror in which everyone shows their image. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Porch as Mud Room
The porch has always been the mud room at 173 since we became the inhabitants, and likely throughout it's history. And as we were nearing the completion of the back porch remodel, the mud room aspect really began to take shape. We put in cabinets...
I made a shoe rack...
And an umbrella stand...
But we needed a place to hang coats when we came in from the rain, or our hats in the summer, and to top it off - that blank wall just kept staring at me!
The Solution
After all the painting was done on the back porch, and really for some time before that, a lot of thought went into what kind of coat rack to put in. We didn't want a lot, we didn't want a free standing rack, or one of those wall mounted with 5 or 6 hooks (that ended up in the sally port in the kitchen).
Then somewhere we got the idea for a couple simple hooks. And I don't recall where we saw this, or how we knew they existed, but we found just the right thing...Dragonfly hooks - they fit right in with the back yard aesthetic!
But I digress, this was really supposed to be about the mirror so let's get back to that! The wall was all ready, we had coat hooks, all that was left was a mirror. It turns out that I had an old cabinet door inherited from the Mosher's stored in my workshop. I think the wood was cherry and it even still had the hinges on it. Of course back then I didn't take before pictures, so the best I can do is this little peek:
So I just cleaned it up, went down to Dave's Glass and had a piece of mirror cut and - et voila! 173 had a mirror in the mud room, on the porch!
And as much as we don't actually consider it, this mirror is pretty much last hair, shirt, coat check before heading out to work. And here's the little mirror in its natural habitat...
Heck - maybe we really do notice it!
Like I said, not an exciting post, but I appreciate you hangin' in there! Thanks for stopping by and see you next time!
