Historic Home Restorations
For nearly 50 years, historic home repair has been a specialty at Tom Turcketta Building and Remodeling. Our skilled woodworkers and craftsmen understand the complexities of antique homes, and during his multifaceted career, Tom Turcketta has worked on more than 100 historic home restorations, transforming and updating properties dating from the 18th century, while maintaining their distinctive character.
Historic home restoration can be the repair, reproduction and replacement of historical details, the complete replacement of materials compromised by rot, insects or fire damage, and the restoration of materials using epoxies and compounds. It can mean adding onto an antique structure, while maintaining the architectural character and details sensitive to the surrounding buildings in a historic district.
I’ve always had an eye for detail. Working on antique homes is much more appealing to me than building a new home. It’s more of a challenge. I love the architectural lines of the period structures.
Historically Sensitive Restorations
We can perform an extensive restoration of your house to bring it up to today’s modern standard of living, with upgraded heating and air conditioning systems, while restoring and reproducing the period elements that make it unique.
We believe that it is fundamentally important to preserve history whenever possible. Therefore, we will employ existing woodwork and period components to preserve historical details. In many cases, we can salvage a fair amount of the existing trim, and then reproduce trim that matches precisely. Our goal is to maintain the authenticity and structural integrity of your home, while making modifications that produce efficiency and performance.
Call 508-385-3672
Let’s work together to preserve your home’s history
Historical Authenticity is Important
Everything we create appears to be authentic, and in some cases made by hand, so we can match virtually any molding found on an antique house. We are experts at using Dutchman (an old carpenter’s term) method of repair, in which we fit like materials to repair a damaged area by patching and shaping to match the existing materials.
This work relies heavily on the understanding of old buildings and period design details and materials used during the process. Tom has thoroughly researched historic periods so that he can accurately reproduce the shapes of molding and utilize joinery techniques like dovetail, mortise and tenon, cog joints, scarf joints and alike to restore and renovate everything from Colonials to Greek Revivals to Victorians to their finest detail.
You have to understand how things go together before you can take it apart and make an accurate repair
Complete General Contractor Service
If you’re in need of a cedar roof or cedar siding company, a house lifting contractor or a foundation, we can also help you with those needs. We will install a red cedar roof, white cedar siding and clapboard siding. We can stabilize an old structure by lifting it up or jacking to replace the sills and corner posts, straightening a wall.
At a circa-1768 house in South Dennis that was compromised by rot, carpenter ants and termites, we had a house lifted up, and allowed the floor to fall out. We built a new foundation with a full basement poured. We then built a new floor frame in a similar, if not the same, manner that would have been employed at the time it was originally built, reusing the existing cedar log joists and setting them in new cog joints. We installed a rough pine board subflooring with a second layer of modern sub-flooring, then installed the salvaged floor boards.
Unparalleled Local Knowledge
Historic restoration demands a comprehensive understanding of local building codes, historic district committees and EPA laws and regulations. Tom sits on the Old King’s Highway Historic District Committee, and he will guide your restoration every step of the way, serving as the general contractor and hiring the mechanical subs, the plumbers, the electricians, and foundation and the heating contractors, while handling all the permitting.
