The grandparents of the present Owners of this cottage built it close to the edge of the lake. The interior was all original tongue-and-groove cedar, now turned a lovely caramel colour; we didn't want to change the feeling of the place at all. But the floors sagged; the foundations were rotten, the bathrooms were too few, and the kitchen too small. The outside needed sprucing up. Besides, there was no deck or open porch outside for enjoying the sunsets.

To fix the sagging floors, we had to hoist the building eight feet in the air, to cut out the rotten floor joists from underneath. Then we set it back down, and attached a Kitchen addition and a graceful curving deck. The floors were now straight, there was room for the family to gather in the Kitchen, the original rooms had never looked better, and the long lakeside deck could accomodate the biggest family gathering ever.

In the new kitchen, the owners asked us to use the same tongue-and-groove woodwork that was elsewhere in the original cottage. You can see how it works on the walls and ceiling, and the great natural light that floods the room shows off the maple plank floor.

In the old Cottage verandah, we replaced the rotten floor joists and deck, staightened the rafters, and made the windows open again. This restoration work gave a new life to the covered verandah, an important room for family life in this old Muskoka retreat.