Historic Restoration
No matter your building, church or home size, we are your solutions experts in historic roofing restoration. If you are the proud owner of an existing historic roof structure requiring re-roofing, roof repair or roof emergency services, we're here to help.
Our licensed, professional team of restoration roofing experts has years of experience on all kinds of roofing projects.
Don't trust your historic restoration to anyone else – you can depend on us for getting the job done right the first time, on time and within your budget. Give us a call today for a free estimate on your restoration needs!
Restoration tasks:
- Slate, Tile, Metal roofs, and various absolute roofing products
- Reproduction & installation of ornamental sheet metal works
- Restoration of windows
- Restoration of siding and all trims
- Structural framing and timber works
- Historic plaster works
Restoration Photo Gallery
Plantation Home Metal Roof Restoration
This historic home had a tin roof that was at the end of its life. Once Leska begin removing the original roof, he discovered that the original cedar roof had completely deteriorated and a large amount of sub wood had being damaged. Leska replaced a lot of lumber with 1x6 & 1x8 to be more historically accurate. The house has lots of intricate metal details. Curved tapered panels on the wraparound porch, bay windows built into the roof, gazebos, and intricate roof transitions. Leska also flashed a couple of chimneys and one velux skylight. He had the opportunity to carefully examine the mistakes of tin craftsmen 100 years ago, and in a few sections improved the original layout or detail. (Gazebo pics etc...) Leska used thicker gauge and better treated prepainted metal. Otherwise, this roof was installed with the same attention to detail as it was 100 years ago. Unfortunately, the majorities of 20th century roofers rely on silicone and don't learn how to create 100% waterproof seams by folding metal, ultimately creating everywhere a double seam.
Per the client's request, and to blend with the white siding, aluminum round gutters and later snow guards were also installed.
Mansard roof with Turret and Tile
This townhouse in Baltimore originally had custom–made turret tile. Leska was called to help after the previous roofer removed and threw away in a dumpster all of the tile from the entire Mansard roof, when only about 20 tiles were broken or missing. After almost one year of not showing up on this project, Leska took over.
Leska gave the owner many options, including reproducing custom tiles for the turret. For cost reasons, in the end Leska created custom–made tapered copper panels on the entire round turret. The most exciting part of the project was recreating all the ornamental copper sofits for the straight section and also for the turret. This 14–section semi–circle turret soffit has built–in box gutter, which Leska duplicated very closely to the original. In addition, all the tin ornamental pieces were replaced and reproduced in copper.
Leska located and reinstalled historically accurate T12 high-glazed clay tile. New 20oz copper downspouts with heavy duty straps secure the downspouts from theft.
Leska powerwashed and repainted the front side of the townhouse.
1764 Arts and Crafts Restoration
This historic Arts and Craft house in Garrison Park, Baltimore, had original Bangor slate with tin flashing details. Leska salvaged less than 10% of the Bangor slate – which is the most moisture–absorbing slate, with a life expectancy of around 100 years. Leska repaired the rotten boards with 1x8 lumber, upgraded all the flashing to copper, and used Spanish Del Carmen slate (16x10). In addition to the roof restoration, Leska repaired rotten dormer trims and crown molding. A unique feature of this house is the extensive crown molding use, even on facia boards. This feature had been hidden for the past 30 years, with 2x4 to create a flat surface for square aluminum gutters, which we removed. Leska used European gutter hangers secured directly to trusses to show this nice feature.
The porch addition had such damage to the roof joists that the entire roof joists and roofing substrate with all trims were completely rebuilt and new posts and railing detail was also matched. Leska truly matched every single detail on these posts. Each molding was routed out and recreated. The heights of the posts were elongated to pass new code. Modern materials were used on the posts themselves. Railing and pickets were made from cedar, as were the original posts.
This porch area had so many layers of EPDM that in the middle of the summer the owner could not enjoy that part of the house unless he wanted to get stuck in hot asphalt. Leska installed Duradek membrane – designed for such a purpose. Glass of wine and good book recommended!
Interior damage to the plaster was repaired with plaster patch.
