BEFORES THE HILLHOUSE This one was the hardest, most time consuming, most painful. Literally. We almost gave up more than once over the years it took to pull it from hellhole to habitable. Glad we started back up to finish her (after almost quitting so many times & almost killing each other in the process).Below is the letter we wrote her last year on the day we moved in. So many ways we screwed up trying to save this one #lessonsLearned * The rest of the Before & Afters at #WandawegaRehabsA PROMISE TO A HOUSE (and a lady we never got to meet)Dear House, Its been 90-plus years since someone moved into you for the very first time – a little fishing cabin on a tiny lake. 3 years ago when we started your resurrection we tried to save as much of you as we could. But In the process, we found that too much was too far gone.We did manage to save some of your bones: your old creaky floors are still underneath the new ones. Your cellar staircase still lies beneath the shiny replacement. A piece of one of your old beams has become your new fireplace manteland the walls will be hung with the memory of one of your former owners (a Ziegfeld Girl-turned-LadyBoss-mom-of-four, Ruth Foster Froemming, who was the 1st woman to run for Mayor of Milwaukee). House, your wooden skeleton beneath your shiny new siding will keep us grounded – your foundation reminding us of nearly a century that you brought a warm spot to blue collar vacationers visiting a tiny Wisconsin lake.Today is the day you will be moved into again for the 1st time. The day you get your new lease on life. We are going to fill you with everything we love, and share you with everyone we love. We promise to extend your days long after ours are done – in hopes that another 90 years from now, you will still be serving your intended purpose. A little house by a little lake where people can do the same things generations before us have done here. Exhale. ( *we hope you like what weve done with the place Ruth * )..After shots: @bobcoscarelliArchitect @cargo_north @rejuvenation @rejuvenationchicago @kohler @lamarzoccohome @fireclaytile @lalunecollection @thehudsoncompany
April 6, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES The Craft Cabin.We found this one abandoned so deep in brush and hornets nests that we had to crawl through an open hole of siding on the back to get in.Virtually no roof, half a wall missing, no windows & full of years of accumulated junk.(A little elbow grease & a extended forks can go a long way). Weve heard the saying that Whatever good things we build, end up building us. That may be part of the reasonthat we try to find & save the ones that have almost disintegrated into the earth (and the karma of recycling vs building new just fits in here better- where everything has humble roots)We also wanted a little place with some actual history. (from what the long time locals have told us, this was originally a summer sleeping cabin and then a fish cleaning cottage). .So when kids (Charlies age and kids as ancient as us) make crafts in here its got more good residual vibes from its long life before us.I have this crazy vision of making things in here with our grandchildren someday #BigDreamsLittleShacks8-track shot: @bobcoscarelli Last shot: first layout before we redecked it out as the craft cabin.MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #wandawegarehabs
April 2, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES The little log cabin was the first of many tiny houses we moved and restored, and the most meaningful, personal one. (Moved on the back of a flatbed nearly 300 miles from Central Illinois to camp.) Its back story was so layered you could fill a book.So Hearst publishers did, called A Very Modest Cottage, which was inspired by this quote:I had rather be shut up in a very modest cottage with my books, my family and a few old friends, dining on simple bacon, and letting the world roll on as it liked, than to occupy the most splendid post, which any human power can give. Thomas Jefferson.MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #WandawegaRehabs.#WandawegaBefore&After9th shot: @bobcoscarelliLast shot: @davidtsay
March 31, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES Next up in the disturbing condition we found this place in:THE SPORTS EQUIPMENT ROOM1925-1960: maids quarters for the ‘Wandawega Hotel’.1961: Latvian renters from the church for summercamp.2005-2017: storage.2017: gutted it to the studs. new drywall, electric, painted the pine floor, put her to use again.THIS HAPPENED IN THIS ROOM AT 3AM 7 YEARS AGO: When Charlie was a baby, someone crawled in through this window to rob us. Hours later, the cops would come and remove the entire window & frame (the thief was caught on camera pushing up the window with both bare hands on the glass, leaving 2 perfect sets of fingerprints). The recount of what Frankie did to protect his house : https://tinyurl.com/y5alfjpzWe heard somewhere that old houses are full of memories which is why they resist collapse. This place has been resisting for nearly a century already, so were guessing that some good things must have happened here to still have it standing. .MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #wandawegarehabs
March 29, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES .Next up in the scary series:the main lodge community room…When we started this camp resurrection, we found things we wish we had not seen..In cleaning it out, we filled two dumpsters with junk, trailers with donations, and bonfire fodder. Decades of deferred maintenance resulted in this space converted into a hoarders den:- Full sized grocery carts stashed to push around from room to room.- 15-gallon dairy farm iodine tanks, used for water storage?- Piles of 4×8 sheets of of styrofoam boarding up the walls as makeshift insulation.- Dozens of junk chairs.(And so much more that we can’t even describe).But we also found a large advertising photo from the 40s/50s when this place had once been “The Wandwega Hotel” And Wandawega Lake Resort, including a supper club for guests that had a jukebox, proper custom table linens and rows of tables neatly set with Fiestaware and Early California china. In the months of digging our way through to daylight – we would find the original restaurant tables (in basements and attics) and all those original dishes (in abandoned shelving behind paneling). We found artifacts that told the story of decades of vacationers before us (their books, records, remnants of the Church, etc.)..What we found the most valuable is the realization that places -like people, at times -can lose their way. They fall into the hands of those without the means or will to care for them, and then experience setbacks. Sometimes those setbacks can destroy them.But sometimes there can still be a little light inside that if you look damn hard, you can find and pull back out; pull it back to it’s best self..We always try to look for the light..MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #wandawegarehabs
March 28, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
>..Next up: The Sterlingworth Cabin.Found her abandoned in a backyard on route 12. (whipped a U-turn, knocked on the door and gave a very hung over 20-something $500 for it. Then scooped her up with a bobcat days later.) We found out later that It was once part of a collection of cottages that bordered the shores of lauderdale lakes… one of many rental cottages that were part of the majestic (now gone) Sterlingworth Inn. Less than 9x9ft interior space, it was designed for guests to spend their time on the lake, not in the room. So we moved her, gutted to the studs, did a roof tear-off and replacement. she got a new hardwood floor & electrical, replaced a good chunk of the rotten siding. pulled some steps from a dumpster, a deck from a Boyscout camp tent platform, and added solar. In total, under a couple thousand bucks and lot of elbow grease..MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #wandawegarehabs
March 27, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES ..3rd in the series: ANOTHER TERRIFYING BATHROOM.These photos speak for themselves. .Not shown:SO many things found in here that are just too disturbing and need to be banished from memory. (To say this place was dilapidated is a gross understatement).Nothing salvageable here #completegutjob. We did manage to bring in vintage kohler sink, 1940s gas station paper towel dispenser and a few things to make it less disturbing. (And now have a home for obsessive hoarding of vintage scout group photos). BUDGET:tile floor: $500tile shower: $700vintage sink: $50not having to ever see that blair witch bathroom situ again: PRICELESS. .MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #wandawegarehabs
March 26, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES . .Second up in the (scary before) series: .The little lakeside cabin.THE RESURRECTION:We wished that they had left it alone. When it was new in the 20’s, it had rustic cedar walls and a screened in porch. Somebody in the late 60’s thought it would be a good idea to drop it’s ceiling, rip out the cedar walls, throw up cheap paneling and conceal those perfect pine floors in the cheesiest of linoleum. And so the gutting began. .FOUND:- An original window under the siding- A small rodent skeleton.- Newspapers in the walls.Then and now, 1949ish?: Pictured in the last photo, this is the former owner’s son & his girlfriend. He would marry this gal soon after this photo was taken. They would have 2 daughters who were raised at camp. Flash forward 66 years to the day those 2 little girls (now grandmas) would show up at our doorstep and give us this picture of their adorable, young parents back in the day.WHAT ELSE WE UNCOVERED: Years after we got this place, a local historian sent us an article that appeared in the Elkhorn Independent Newspaper, Monday, August 31, 1942: Chicago man ‘John Gabriele, 35 had been cast aside by his sweetheart, Miss Virginia Bodziach. Rejected and pushed to the breaking point, then to murder and kidnapping, he stole a car on a high-speed getaway up Route 12, into Walworth County- checking into this cottage at the Wandawega Hotel- It would be his last hiding place..MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #WandawegaRehabs
March 25, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
BEFORES .This level of honesty might be the worst idea ever (especially in hospitality). But its also sometimes a motivator for us.The rooms and cabins here are not special . What gives us perspective and continues to make us not give up is the staring point.We started from a really scary, run down place when we bought Camp 15 years ago (and only had dayjob paychecks to fix it up, one room at a time.) Our journey has felt like a lifetime of learning (learning that well always suck at drywalling, for one) .Like anything in life, to appreciate where we are – we sometimes need to look back at where we started. This place was made for folks who didnt have the means to take a real vacation- blue collar vacationers that didnt need a lot to be happy. Camps roots are too humble to pretend to be something that its not.With this reminder, our next several posts will be the SHOW & TELL series of before & afters. (brace yourselves)1st up:This was the innkeepers bath in the lodge, from the madame Anna Peck, to the Andrzewski family, to Father B. THIS is what decades of deferred maintenance looks like. The toilet had dropped through the floor, the light fixture was hanging from a frayed cloth wrapped cord & flickering constantly. The closet was a hoarders den – spilling out with those old 5-qt plastic ice-cream buckets, each overflowing with greasy car parts & junk dating back to the 60s. (Folks that lived through the depression saved EVERYthing). So while the afters arent special, theyre real & a testament that nothing is too far gone to be saved. Be that a space, a vintage piece of furniture, an old car, or a person – a little elbow grease and lots of hope for something better can change everything. Old houses were scaffolding once and workmen whistling .( the junk in the before pics are NOT ours- taken when we where touring it) .MORE befores at 30 days of before and afters at: #WandawegaRehabs
March 24, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
If you don’t know about @artifactuprising- let us please share our creative obsession.We’ve recently been archiving stacks of antique photos of camp to make this history ‘master book’ to print.Now we can’t stop making and dreaming more books, cards, framed prints- ugh… Thanks for the shout-out, Artifact and for the photo @missnortherner
March 22, 2019 • Published by Tereasa Surratt
