Michael Urge

San Francisco, CA

I'm a retired carpenter and business owner.  I own and run a stair shop that builds interior wood stairs and mills architectural wood work.  I still take jobs to keep busy.  When I have time, I'm working on my other project restoring the front of my house which is a Queen Anne Victorian.  I Removed the stucco and found out the wood work still had the original lead paint with some water damage.  I replaced the ship lap with Alaskan cedar and the scroll work I used mahogany and painted the front of the house with special high quality paint from Holland.  Much better than the paint you buy here because it last longer.  I'm now in the process of doing my front stairs in stone.  Wood is more comfortable on your feet but I want something that's going to last and with little maintenance.

The large Eastlake framed mirror I've had for over thirty years which was when I used to go down to the auction houses and buy Victorian furniture and restore them.  This is the main contents of my home. I still have a few pieces that need work.  Right now I have a secretary that I'm restoring but then it's hard to find the time to work on it.  The fireplace mantel you see in the pictures I built.  It's made of Jatoba or Brazilian Cherry.  The hall mirror and the framed print of a little girl in a Sunday dress were obtained from antique stores.  The other frames along with the lithograph prints and tin type photos, were taken from other frames to put together a beautiful Eastlake picture frame with both frame and print being period but mostly enjoyable to look at.  The project of buying frames and finding prints for them took me about three years to do.  My source was ebay and I was very lucky obtaining these pieces.  The wife was a little doubtful about hanging frames the Victorian way but I think she now sees the light.