Something Novel: A Project Completed

A few weeks ago (nanoseconds in the slow-moving calendar that governs home improvement projects), I completed the rough carpentry needed to frame a step in our living room that has been awaiting construction since before we moved in more than a year ago. While the raw lumber molded into the pleasing shape of a step was nice, the project begged to be finished. The carpet remnants were ready, just waiting for me to work up the courage to do the hardest part: the finish carpentry that everyone can see. Years of building plastic model kits as a kid taught me, repeatedly, the heartbreak of marring an otherwise brilliant project with one misplaced brushstroke in the last step that everyone can see. The chances of ruining my solid carpentry work with poorly installed carpet were, I figured, uncomfortably high.

In contemplating the final product, I decided to use the wood floor planks left over from the kitchen and breakfast room that leads to the doorway where the step is located, and only carpet the rise of the step. This required some sort of transition from floor planks to the edge, which I solved with a lightly beveled oak strip located at our friendly neighborhood Orchard Supply Hardware. I still had the issue of the double 45 degree angles, ensuring that several planks would require custom cutting on my indispensable miter saw. The first row of planks also had to be trimmed longitudinally by about half an inch to allow room for the beveled edging.

Amazingly, it all came together very nicely, using up every last piece of the leftover flooring, as if it had been specially ordered for the job. The vertical carpet went in well:


The floorboards fit nicely, leaving room for the border:



With the beveled edge, the project is complete:


Almost complete, that is. Far too much time spent on the miter saw yielded complex but satisfying baseboards to wrap the whole thing up:


Some putty and a little extra paint will tidy up those seams. I should get to that in, say, March.