80 Year Old House Reno 17: Installing Siding

Back to work on the old house renovation! Summer is well under way, but the siding on the addition is finished. Let’s take a look at what we’ve done!

A long time ago, Kent decided he liked the board and batten siding. To be honest, it didn’t really matter to me. The product he picked out in the end was chosen for its size options. It was the only one available to him that had at least ten-foot lengths for the living room side. We agreed we did not want a belt line that would come from piecing together shorter lengths.

Installing Siding on our 80 Year Old House Renovation

For the technically curious, we installed LP SmartSide, an engineered wood siding product. It is light weight and flexible, as opposed to the heavy, brittle cement fibre siding. Kent has worked with the latter, and decided against it.

The gable ends are sided in shaker-look panels. That was a non-negotiable for me, and not a problem for the hubby. He installed the shakes with the staggered edge down – a country look for a country property.

Both the board and batten and the shakes have a grain stamped into them which delivers the classic look of wood. The shadows give highlights to the colour.

The only problem was that this company (and others) have about a dozen colours to choose from – nine of them white, grey or brown. That leaves one red, one blue and one green. You know me and white – I did not want to live in an igloo six months of the year.

I wanted a light-medium green – the green available was almost black. So we bought pre-primed siding and custom painted it.

I was inspired by some cabins on a trip to cottage country, Kenora, ON. The green blended into the forest, but was light enough to stand out.

My sisters, however, influenced me to take it a shade darker, or three or seven. It was a good influence, though I didn’t go with the darkest suggestion, but the Dwarf Fir won’t fade out in the sun.

The board and batten is painted Sico’s Dwarf Fir (not Door Fur, as someone wrote on the paint can!), and the gable shakes are Sico’s Dark Tobacco.

Kent installed the board and batten, and the kids and I painted after. The joke goes that Kent picked the colours and the kids painted. Ok then. Thanks, guys.

This grain in the siding is really meant to be painted with a sprayer, but many hands make lighter work. It wasn’t really too bad to paint by hand once we got the hang of things, and we were able to borrow some scaffolding for the tall walls.

Even with the scaffolding, I had no intention of climbing to heights to paint the gables. You may remember our high adventure installing fascia here. I painted the panels prior to installation, and Kent painted the ends if they needed cutting – you know, the angles plus cutting around chimney brackets and attic access at over fifteen feet. Go Kent.

The next set of windows is ordered for replacement in the old part of the house. When they arrive we can install them and then replace the siding. That could be quite the adventure. Who knows what we will find in the old walls. We’ve found plenty, already, back in this article and this article.

In the mean time, the garden needs desperate weeding, and perhaps the northern mountain will get leveled (the pile from the basement dig. The kids lose a sledding hill, we get our view back and can watch for deer in the garden at night…) Then more painting, starting with shakes for the other gables on our old house renovation. See you then.

Check out these other renovation updates:

80 Year Old House Remodel 2: Demolition

80 Year Old House Remodel 5: Raising the Roof

80 Year Old House Remodel 14: Kitchen