Shown here is the adobe wall old plaster demo under way. This small adobe house which was built in perhaps the mid 1940’s in Dixon, New Mexico had been since acquired by the owner, lovingly restored room by room. The small house is roughly just over 600 square feet, not counting a large enclosed old storage room. Norbert worked on this house for some years before we became involved when we teamed up. The house has slowly become a beautiful space due to the great taste of the current owner, a friend.
Having prior issues with other people working on the old earthen walls – specifically, a build up of too many plaster coats which caused the new plaster walls to crumble – we approached this room renovation with extreme caution. We deduced that the old earthen plasters originally put upon the walls were a weak silty plaster mix and were therefore not a good surface with which to place a new, custom plaster.
Not ones to take chances that something might fail – we concluded after consulting the owner that the old plaster need be removed. So we set about tearing off the old plaster down to the old original adobe brick walls. It was a messy, hard process, but a necessary one. This image shows the plaster demo in process. Luckily the room was small and our client gracious enough to endure a demolition while living in the space. Let’s just say we were happy when this part of the project had been completed and we could move on to creating the new floors and clean, crisp newly plastered walls.