September 30, 2008 Progress Report
The progress this month in stone-work, ArcusStone on Missouri’s east wall and the elevator tower turrets, and the cedar shakes in their layered pattern…all have made the entry to Bear Dance Village an eye-catcher.
Good news, everyone! The Camel Committee at Bear Dance Village been contacted by Congress for our help! Apparently word has made it to Washington that we have a reputation for creative ideas, so they’ve contacted us to help revise their financial bailout plan for the American economy, since it doesn’t seem to be working so far. Not to worry, though – we’ll still be able to maintain our same pace of production here on the jobsite.
Wouldn’t it be great if that were true? Even though it’s wishful thinking, we’re thankful to be able to show up here every day and have something enjoyable to do in spite of all the doom and gloom; and believe us – things have been moving right along. Last month we talked about our dilemma of never wanting this project to end, while at the same time wanting to be done so we could see everything. We found ourselves dealing with that same conflicting emotion again this month. The contractors here on site (approximately 50 workers here each day) are continuing to out-do themselves, improving on their techniques continually, so that each place they work has a little bit of an improvement from the previous (and you’ve heard us bragging about the previous places – imagine an improved product!).
Another theme you’ve heard us mention is the amount of local chatter that’s happening with regards to Bear Dance Village. Until recently, most of that chatter had been amongst local citizens in the community…friends and family members. But apparently local citizens aren’t the only ones who like to discuss projects like this; there has been a noticeable upswing in comments we’ve heard amongst the local members of the construction industry. Everyone is wanting to know some of our secrets. They want to know how we make these buildings look like they’ve been here for hundreds of years. They want to know how our painting and staining techniques. They want to come look at our masonry work. There’s a lot of whispering about our thatched-style cedar shake roof. We may very well have started a new trend for Northwest Montana construction (or beyond). Old-World-European-Mountain-Village-Fusion (a term coined by Ron as our ‘theme’ for this project) might need to be trademarked!
As we mentioned, the workers have been out-doing themselves, and nowhere is that more apparent than with the Flathead Masonry crew. Of course, we started our stonework with the Yellowstone building, and that one has gotten quite a bit of press (rightfully so). It was our first foray into the Old World style, and we’ve worked continually since then to improve upon our techniques – after all, we didn’t want to make things look the same everywhere anyway. We incorporated a few ideas as we moved on, based on research and photos, changing a rock species here, and a grout style there. As we applied the stone to our root cellars, we wanted a rougher look, a little less clean. Then we began installing stone on the five-plex, and on Missouri’s outdoor chimney, we got creative with mixing the sizes of some of our stone. When that was finished, the guys moved up to the back wall of the parking garage; there we mixed our rougher look with the combination of stone sizes for an authentic ‘basement wall’ look. Now, at month’s end, we’re working our way around the stair tower of The Swan, and it could very easily surpass The Yellowstone in character and interest!
Sam surveys the rolling shakes during installation, utilizing the proven ‘step-back’ technique: He’s constantly stepping back to observe the roofing from a distance, ensuring a quality finished product.
Only problem is, most people arriving at Bear Dance Village might not make it all the way down to The Swan to see the new things there. They’ll be too busy standing up at the street, gawking at all the new changes to the five-plex – most notably the cedar roofing. This has been undoubtedly our biggest attention-getter in recent weeks. It’s an application that most of the veteran roofers simply laughed at with a You-can’t-do-that mentality, but we’ve got a young guy named Sam who has taken hold of the idea with a willingness to learn and be creative. He simply looked at a photo, worked with us to figure out an initial technique, then got going on it, improving his technique as he goes. Now his two-man crew is up to seven guys, and they’re making serious headway on this eye-catching roofing style. If we didn’t have the fellow contractors and tradesmen talking about this project before, the roofing has certainly done it!
Sometimes, though, it seems as if every worker in the valley is on this site. Each day averages around 50 workers, which explains why so much has gotten done. We call it controlled hysteria. Other highlights of progress in the past month have included new windows for the exercise room; more ArcusStone applied; finished root cellars; poured concrete on our rooftop patios; countless hours of plumbing, electrical, HVAC and central vacuum rough-ins; new timbers in Big Horn’s great room; painting and staining of thousands of lineal feet of window trim and batten strips; more urethane insulation; gyp-crete for radiant tubing in Missouri and Madison; stacking stone retaining walls; some fantastic new ideas from the Camel Committee; tile installation in Boulder and Yellowstone; more steelwork for exterior and interior (decorative and structural); lots of inspection work from the flat-roof contractor (Roof Works of Kalispell); and the construction of a new pond.
Working on the backfill of our root-cellar-style boiler vaults. The stone work making the slope will get mortar joints to make the whole face have a matching look.
Did we miss anything?
Probably so, but that’s what is so much fun about this place. We give a tour, and even if it lasts three hours, we feel like we’ve just barely scratched the surface. We’re having fun, the workers are having fun, and – incredibly – the owners are having fun!
Now if you’ll excuse us, we need to take a short trip to Washington, D.C.