1987 - Volume #11, Issue #5, Page #18

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They Converted granary into a luxurious home

They Converted granary into a luxurious home FARM HOME Houses 11-5-18 Old granaries make great homes say Ed and Dorothy Wichman, Grand Rapids, Ohio, who spent 2¢ years converting a century-old granary into a luxurious home. The Wichman's granary home still looks like a granary, inside and out, because they preserved many of the features of the 20 by 30-ft. farm structure. Hand-hewn beams exposed throughout the building and other features, such as a grain chute trap door still in the dining room ceiling, remind visitors of the building's origin. Individual bins inside the building were convened into separate rooms. The original wooden bin floors were sanded and refinished to a mirror-like finish. The stairs leading to a second-floor bedroom and sitting room are original. Ed corncob-blasted the stairs to remove a century of grime. He notes that the corncob method is much gentler than sand blasting. Outside, the vertical siding was removed during construction and then replaced and repainted. The entire conversion took 2¢ years to complete. The building, which was built in 1850, was moved to a new housing site and mounted on rock and concrete pillars to avoid flood waters from a nearby river.