Using tongs, Jim Moran sticks a long, thin piece of wire into the small but very hot fire of the blacksmith’s forge.
When he removes the metal, the tip is white hot.
Taking an old run-down house and turning it into a spanking new home is what Allan Barber loves to do. Still, the structure at 12 Morris Ave. in Schenectady was quite a daunting challenge.
Barber has shared the home with Craig Taylor since they bought it together in 2005. The two men had been living in a home on Campbell Avenue they had renovated back in 2000, and very likely would have remained there if not for a phone call from another Morris Avenue resident, Bernard McEvoy. McEvoy, who spearheaded the effort to get Morris Avenue designated as a historic district back in 1992, was looking for new owners to move into the vacant home just across the street.
“We were already living in a beautiful house when Dr. McEvoy called. So I told him, ‘no thank you,’ ” said Barber. “But then I talked to Craig and we decided to take a look at it. The house had been empty for a year and was in foreclosure. It was a total mess. But, here we are.”
The two men purchased the home in April of 2005, started work on it right away, and by August it was ready to move in. Posted on June 16, 2009.
A chandelier hangs from the coffered ceiling. New owners Allan Barber and Craig Taylor resisted the temptation to change it. “That ceiling is original to the house,” Barber said.
