25 Mar

Posted at 09:25h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions by

aside from operating urban remains, a museum and galley, and documenting and salvaging historic structures, i managed to make time here and there for over a year now, devoted to creating and ultimately self-publishing the BLDG. 51 "museum book," which was delivered to me the other...

24 Mar

Posted at 17:00h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

i've been aggressively acquiring architectural artifacts and industrial furniture for most of march, while i patiently await to begin work on two important salvages beginning this spring. i was fortunate and pleasantly surprised that a decent number of important artifacts essentially fell into my lap the...

24 Mar

Posted at 12:46h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions by

the photo gallery below offers a glimpse of some of the newest artifacts recently acquired from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 22,600 item mark. the...

23 Mar

Posted at 17:53h in Bldg. 51, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

my team and i just completed salvaging a multi-story early 20th century chicago residential masonry building with protruding ornamented tin bay window integrated with a cornice topped with opposed pier caps and voluted roofline ornament. the majority of the building's interior underwent several tasteless renovations during its lifespan,...

16 Mar

Posted at 12:04h in Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

with an extended break from the architectural salvage front, urban remains pushed further into the realm of "industrial" late last week by obtaining a nice assortment of industrial furniture from a recently shuttered factory that specialized in the fabrication of aeronautics parts. the gallery below represents...

13 Mar

Posted at 14:02h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

shortly after the pre-fire german school building salvage concluded last weekend, we shifted gears and revisited "industrial," by exploring factories, machine shops and warehouses in the chicago area this week to replenish and/or build upon our existing supply of furniture and lighting found in that...

12 Mar

Posted at 16:36h in Bldg. 51, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

the assemblage of wood boards represent a mostly intact mid-19th century early chicago residential "privy vault" pine wood floor that was likely constructed by j.k. russell & company, chicago, il.   the defunct outhouse privy hole or "vault" floor was discovered on the john kent russell house...

11 Mar

Posted at 16:34h in Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

we just salvaged two heavily ornamented cast iron flanking mullion or pilaster endcaps from a victorian era red brick and limestone three-flat combination commercial/residential building shortly before it was brought down by the wrecking ball. the square-shaped single-sided endcaps or "plate guards" were the two most distinctive components...

11 Mar

Posted at 01:04h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

the photo gallery below offers a glimpse of some of the newest artifacts recently acquired from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 22, 500 item...

09 Mar

Posted at 22:54h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, Salvages by

with the exception of the building itself, the only remaining exterior architectural ornament left undisturbed on the historically important augustus bauer-designed german school, a survivor of the great chicago fire, is a simple, yet elegant hand-carved oversized side entrance keystone featuring a a raised and...

07 Mar

Posted at 22:06h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions, Salvages by

for the past two days i've devoted morning, afternoon and evening obsessively thinking about anything and everything pertaining to an augustus bauer-designed building constructed in 1869. the arrival of souvenir hunters, the police, an alderman, and other, largely unhappy individuals coalescing into a rather unnerving and heavily...

04 Mar

Posted at 10:33h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

a project manager working for chicago-based heneghan wrecking informed me late last week that two adjoining 19th century multi-story brick commercial buildings located along lake street were undergoing demolition in preparation for future development on the site. when i arrived onsite demolition was in progress, with a large...

03 Mar

Posted at 18:50h in Events & Announcements, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions by

the photo gallery below offers hand-picked or "highlighted" artifacts from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 22, 400 item mark. the ultimate goal since day...

03 Mar

Posted at 02:19h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

i just finished shooting several recovered artifacts that were used in the construction of a privy vault and cesspool likely constructed between 1855-1865 for chicago carpenter and millwork company owner john kent russell's house (non-extant).  the first of the two unusually-shaped privy vaults was discovered in...

02 Mar

Posted at 14:26h in Bldg. 51, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Sales and Promotions by

while rearranging our large assortment of interior and exterior artifacts salvaged from the historically important daniel h. burnham-designed reliance building last week, we rediscovered crates filled with matching cast iron hinges, escutcheons, doorknobs, office door mail chutes and window sash pulls. the urban remains's website does offer...

24 Feb

Posted at 16:06h in Events & Announcements, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

the photo gallery below offers hand-picked or "highlighted" artifacts from last week's listings (15 new items are added daily in their respective categories) on the urban remains website. as of this writing, we have surpassed the 22, 300 item mark. the ultimate goal since day...

23 Feb

Posted at 06:51h in Bldg. 51, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products, Salvages by

since the day i discovered a light blue cobalt glass william h. hutchinson soda or mineral water bottle resting on a thick privy wood floor discovered behind the john kent russell house, i've been buying each and every virtually identical " w.h.h."cobalt bottle as if...

21 Feb

Posted at 13:19h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

a set of rare and historically important interior darwin d. martin house (1903-1905) wall-mount sconces were acquired by the bldg. 51 museum this week. the strongly geometric designed interior single electric light sconces exhibit a mostly uniform surface patina throughout. it is uncertain whether the white...

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