Standing in the east of the Kogod Courtyard looking up at the canopy in the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

Ian Brown, the head of Railfreight at the time smiles as the spotless ETH fitted Duff breaks the banner with a load of timber for the MDF, particleboard & laminate flooring manufacturer located on the Welsh Marches.

Photo by Stephen Chapman.

Husband and I hit a few yard sales this morning and I found an entertainment center with doors and drawers for a BUCK. It's not the best -- it's particleboard -- but it was a BUCK and it's sturdy enough and it solves some of my organization issues at least in a temporary fashion, and even when I find a more permanent solution, I can use this for something else. I mean gosh. It was a dollar.

Anyhow. Here is a drawer full of little dollies. Maybe they will be easier to find and photograph now.

Standing in the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard -- this time a wide (not vertical) shot looking northwest in the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

Pennsylvania

Action Environmental Ltd. taking away construction waste materials.

Garden Village, Burnaby, British Columbia

Again from the bioblitz at Corral Bluffs Open Space east of Colorado Springs comes two egg sacs of a pirate spider (family Mimetidae), found attached to a chunk of particleboard in the prairie/canyon landscape. Colorado, USA, September 8, 2018.

Published via my blog (www.travishale.com) @ bit.ly/1MXmPjc, visit my blog for more information and images.

Kitchen Cabinet Review is our effort for our audience to learn how to select best kitchen cabinets from thousand of models in the market. Buy above designs from Amazon Here TMS Pacific Stackable Storage with Glass Door amzn.to/2bKbeE3 Inval America 4 Door Storage Cabinet with Microwave Cart, Laricina White amzn.to/2bzsqjr Oak Hills Microwave Traditional Hardwood Cabinet, Oak Finish amzn.to/2bzsTST Home Styles 5100-0066-62 Buffet of Buffets Cottage Oak amzn.to/2bSbS5t Selecting new cabinets can be a major cost while rebuilding and may represent as much as 40 percent of your kitchen redesign spending plan. They set the outline style for your kitchen and you'll have them for quite a long time. No weight, isn't that so? With such requests on dollars and configuration, the present pattern is to be more traditionalist. White cabinets are prominent. So are bureau styles that are not so much fastidious but rather more streamlined, for example, the spotless lines and square corners of Shaker cabinetry. Utilize this purchasing manual for help you pick, yet take note of that Consumer Reports does not test cabinets right now. Shopping Tips: What's in Store for You It used to be that dovetail joints inside the drawers were for all intents and purposes all you expected to recognize top of the line cabinets. That qualification has obscured as more makers offer premium elements, even on low-end lines. Past bureau tests at Consumer Reports demonstrated that you can have these and other once selective components yet still end up with poor development. A little research in advance can spare you time and cash. Research producer and retail sites, then investigate store shows; you'll have the capacity to tell the quality cabinets from the finished actors once you know where to look. Trust your taste. The kitchen ought to supplement whatever is left of your home, so pick what you adore. Consider Your Budget There are three bureau sorts: stock, semi-custom, and custom. (See a one next to the other correlation beneath.) Stock cabinets are once in a while sold at home focuses pre-collected, while Ikea and different stores offer forms that require get together. Stock cabinets are generally constrained in hues and styles. Semi-custom cabinets offer more style alternatives and arrangements, permitting a more exact fit for your kitchen. Custom cabinets are the most costly alternative, however can incorporate numerous additional elements you've picked, and obviously, your definite specs. Pick a Style Surrounded or frameless? Confined are made of a container and face casing, to which the entryways and drawers join. Frameless cabinets, otherwise called European-style, skirt the face outline, and the entryways and drawers join straightforwardly to the bureau box. The look is more contemporary and inside access is less demanding. Be that as it may, the absence of a face edge can bargain unbending nature. Better makers repay by utilizing a thicker box (3/4-inch plywood rather than 1/2-inch particleboard, for instance). In the event that you need the European look additionally need a confined bureau, pick a full-overlay entryway. It covers all or a large portion of the face outline. Review the Construction Well-assembled cabinets have strong wood drawers with dovetail joinery rather than stapled particleboard; full-expansion drawer manages as opposed to an incorporated rail; and entryways with strong wood outlines encompassing a strong wood or plywood board, rather than veneered particleboard or a medium thickness fiberboard (MDF) board. Concentrate on Features Despite the fact that they can build cost by more than 20 percent, helpful elements incorporate a pullout junk can and worked in charging station. A lift bureau, with a spring-stacked rack that swings up and out, offers simple access to your stand blender or sustenance processor. Consider Revitalizing Your old Cabinets In the event that your present cabinets are plumb, square, and solid, consider repainting or revamping them. To do it right, expel entryways and drawers, clean them with a degreasing specialist, sandpaper, and apply a preliminary and different top coats (or pay an expert about $50 per entryway). Bureau refacing is additionally a choice. It's optimal for encircled units and includes supplanting the entryways and drawers, and applying new finishes to the face edges and closures. Expense is about $150 per bureau. You can likewise make old cabinets simpler to use by including haul out racks, languid Susans, and other economical updates. The last touch: Install under-bureau LED assignment lights. Subscribe our channel here:https://goo.gl/9ApveO Find us on Social Media Facebook:http://ift.tt/2aErCb9 Twitter:https://twitter.com/kitchenpicks Pinterest:http://ift.tt/2asdvSQ Stumbleupon:http://goo.gl/IRmfxA Google+:https://goo.gl/ktm6wp

...best viewed large...

Gift for a coworker who is retiring on Friday :) Approx. 7.5 x 7.5 inches on particleboard. Crystal fusion glass tiles, stained glass, glass rods, millefiori, glass beads and repurposed scrabble tiles.

A&P installed the original Fresh Market decor package into A&P, Waldbaums and Superfresh stores with very slight changes to adjust for the corresponding banner. The giant wallboards which were placed around the perimeter of the store had the word "fresh" in the bottom left-hand corner for A&P and Waldbaums, while Superfresh got the round Superfresh 'S'. For Waldbaums, the leaf that served as an apostrophe in the Waldbaums logo was attached to the word "fresh", while A&P got the A&P sunrise logo.

The Fresh Market decor package also featured nostalgic scenes from early A&P stores which was printed and attached to particleboard which ran across the top of refrigerated cases, which you can see here. IMHO, it was one of the nicest touches added to the Fresh Market stores. Needless to say, many of the classic scenes featured A&P logos or the words "Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company". If you compare the 2 pictures here, in the Waldbaums version, any reference to A&P has been photoshopped out. For example, compare the delivery truck from the A&P on the left with the very same truck at the former Waldbaums at the right. The round A&P logo has been edited out at Waldbaums, as have many other instances of the logo (the coffee service) if you look closely.

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Superfresh has arrived in New York City! This 40,000 s. ft. store is not only the first Superfresh in New York, but it is located less than 10 miles from Key Food's corporate headquarters, which may help to explain why this store is so different from the Bloomfield, NJ and Paterson, NJ Superfresh stores that Key Food has opened so far.

The Superfresh here on Amboy Road in the Pleasant Plains neighborhood of Staten Island held its grand opening the week before memorial day, and replaces a longtime Waldbaums Fresh store (which was possibly a former A&P)

Working with wood. Candid shot, Hemyock, Devon UK.

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Sawdust or wood dust is a by-product of cutting, grinding, drilling, sanding, or otherwise pulverizing wood with a saw or other tool; it is composed of fine particles of wood. It is also the byproduct of certain animals, birds and insects which live in wood, such as the woodpecker and carpenter ant. It can present a hazard in manufacturing industries, especially in terms of its flammability. Sawdust is the main component of particleboard.

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I Bet you didn't Know:

Cellulose, fibre starch that is indigestible to humans, and a filler in some low calorie foods, can be and is made from sawdust, as well as from other plant sources

Standing in the east of the Kogod Courtyard looking west and up at the canopy in the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

The bathroom is one of the biggest changes in the apartment.

New flooring

New sink

New cabinet

New beadboard

It doesn't even look like the same place!

Standing the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard looking northeast. This is the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

From a "new roof".

Standing in the east of the Kogod Courtyard looking west in the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

Standing in the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard looking northwest and up at the canopy over the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

We turned 2 Ikea EXPEDIT 5x1's into one 5x2. Basically the forth horizontal shelf was cut in half to create the 2 end pieces — with some smushing of the honeycomb and a small piece particleboard cut and glued inside the bottom for supporting the weight and bottom screws. Then the existing end pieces were pilfered for their laments ends, which after a lot of work to get all the particleboard remnants off, were glued to the unfinished tops (were ends of the horizontal piece).

Standing in the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard looking north at mid-afternoon shadows on the wall of the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

Standing in the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard looking north at the Courtyard Cafe in the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

Standing in the southeast corner of the Kogod Courtyard looking north at the entrance to the north wing. This is the central courtyard linking the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., in the United States.

U.S. patent law of 1790 required inventors to submit a scale model of their invention. In 1810, Congress authorized the purchase of the unfinished Blodgett's Hotel to house the U.S. Post Office and the Patent Office. But the patent office quickly ran out of space due to the hundreds of models it had to house. Even though Blodgett's Hotel was enlarged in 1829, the need for a new building was clear. On July 4, 1836 (the same date it enacted the landmark Patent Act of 1836), Congress authorized erection of a new patent office building. But even as ground was broken for the new building, Blodgett's Hotel burned to the ground on December 15, 1836, causing the loss of nearly all its records and models, and its entire library.

Architect Robert Mills designed the new Patent Office building. Mills was a protegé of Benjamin Henry Latrobe (architect of the Capitol) and James Hoban (architect of the White House), and had designed many important churches in the U.S. as well as a highly regarded prison in New Jersey notable for its reformatory rather than punitive aspects. 1836 was "the year of Mills". Not only did he win the Patent Office commission, but his designs for the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building were also chosen by the federal government.

The Patent Office building was built on a large public square which Pierre L'Enfant had originally set aside for a massive nondenominational church. Both G Street and F Street were diverted around this square, which was a third larger than the average block in the city. Mills designed a Greek Revival structure that would have massive, ceremonial entrances on both the north and south sides. His model was the Parthenon in Athens. This was a new design, for most neoclassical buildings in D.C. had been based on Roman structures or Romanesque Revival buildings constructed during the Renaissance (1400 to 1650). Mills was a big promoter of "fireproof" buildings made with as little timber as possible. This meant using masonry piers and vaults, and iron trusses where possible. As this was the day of whale-oil lighting, Mills designed the building to have a large inner courtyard so that light could reach both the inner and outer offices. The fourth floor of the building also had skylights ("light courts"); this meant the fourth floor could be used for clerical offices (which needed a lot of light), while models, archives, and the library could be on the darker first, second, and third floors.

The Patent Office was made part of the State Department in 1802, because patents involved international law. Under the supervision of the Secretary of State, the south wing of the Patent Office was completed in 1840. In 1849, Congress created the Department of the Interior, and transferred the patent office to this new department. The Interior Department moved into the Patent Office Building alongside its new agency.

Criticizing architects was the main sport of Congress in the early days of the republic. Few buildings were erected with federal funds anywhere in the country (except for post offics and customs houses), and members of Congress were routinely criticized for "subsidizing" the growth of Washington by allocating money for construction there. Furthermore, architects who lost competitions wasted no time in undermining the reputation and work of those who won them, hoping to get the architect fired and to replace him.

Sure enough, construction on the Patent Office building was very slow. Mills was frequently attacked for incompetence, and in congressional committees (hardly staffed with experts!) forced him to add unnecessary tie rods and iron bracing to the building. His most critical opponent wa William Easby, commissioner of public buildings. Easby ran a quarry, and had lost several contracts for the Patent Office building after supply far inferior product. He now took his reveange, repeatedly and without evidence attacking the structural soundsness of Mills' designs. Mills' relationship with Congress soured, and he was dismissed in April 1851.

Another of Mills' harshest critics was architect Thomas U. Walter. A believer in Greek Revival architecture, Walter had designed a large number of banks, churches, courthouses, prisons, and residences in the country. In 1850, he won the competition for the design of the east extention of the U.S. Capitol (and would later design, with Captain Montgomery Meigs of the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Capitol dome).

In 1852, Congress appropriated money for the construction of the east wing, the west wing, and the basement beneath the courtyard. The east wing was completed and occupied in January or February of 1853. This was followed by money for the facade of the north wing in 1856, and completion of the west wing (for patent models) and more construction of the north facade in 1857. The west wing opened in 1856. Money was approved for adding the fourth floor to the west wing in 1858, and completion of the north wing in 1859.

Due to the exigencies of the Civil War, the north wing was not completed and occupied until 1867.

The third floor and attic of the west and north wings of the Patent Office were destroyed by fire in 1877. The cause of the blaze was never fully determined, although many thought that sparks from chimneys landed on the wooden roof above the patent model rooms. (Others thought the fire originated in the patent model rooms.) Not surprisingly, Mill's masonry vaults withstood the fire; Walter's much weaker iron-braced vaults collapsed.

Local German-American architect Adolf Cluss was hired to rebuild the Patent Office Building. Cluss had designed a large number of churches, hotels, office buildings, residences, retail buildings (including the city's first department store, the Lansburgh), and schools in the city. He designed the first Department of Agriculture headquarters in 1867, Center Market (the most advanced public marketplace and grocery store in the country) in 1871, and Eastern Market in 1872 (it still stands), and he rebuilt the Smithsonian Castle in 1867 after a devastating fire there. (His work on the Patent Office reconstruction won him the competition to design the Smithsonian Arts & Industries Building in 1879.) In 1872, Cluss was named City Engineer, and he oversaw the design and construction of the great expansion of public works that transformed Washington in the 1870s: street paving, sewer construction, gas lines, street lighting, and the planting of thousands of trees.

Cluss largely retained the neoclassical facades by Mills and Walter, but made some changes to reflect a more Renaissance look and feel. His greatest changes, however, came in the interior. He significantly strengthened the structural elements of the interior (so they could withstand another fire), which created numerous marble pillars and beautiful vaulted masonry ceilings throughout the interior. He also paved the floors with brilliantly colored encaustic tile, added wonderfully detailed decorative iron railings, and lined the halls with marble wainscoting. He also added a grand double-curved staircase to the south entrance, a Great Hall to replace the model rooms, and installed brilliant stained glass windows throughout. Cluss also redesigned the grand south entrance staircase, which had been damaged by firefighters in 1877.

The Patent Office used the building until 1932, when it moved to new headquarters due to space needs. The Civil Service Commission occupied the building afterward. Appallingly, the widening of F Street in 1935 amputated the monumental south stairs. The Patent Office Building was due to be demolished in 1953. But in one of the first preservation efforts in D.C., it was saved. President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave it to the Smithsonian in 1958. Starting in fall 1964, it was renovated into a museum by the firm of Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and opened as the National Museum of American Art (now the Smithsonian American Art Museum) and the National Portrait Gallery in January 1968. The north wing housed the art museum and the south wing the portrait gallery. Offices and a cafe occupied the east wing, and the west wing was empty. The open-air courtyard had an outdoor cafe.

By 1999, the Old Patent Office Building was in serious need of renovation. Much of the interior space had been converted into office space, making visitor circulation poor. Drop-ceilings of particleboard covered up the vaulted ceilings, many windows had been boarded up on the inside and outside (to prevent light from entering and to add display space), and hallways had been partitioned to add office space and create narrow, ugly galleries. Floors were built across the open space between the mezzanines in the Great Hall to add more space, the great double-staircase on the south side was concealed and used for staff only, and much of the interior moldings, pilasters, cornices, pillars and capitals had been covered over with plywood to create a "modern" look. Outside, the porticos had been closed off, and in some cases concealed or altered to make the columns appear to be pilasters (fake columns). The great north staircase was closed, and the south staircase replaced with modern steel steps.

The building closed in 2000. Most of the modifications to the interior were ripped out, revealing the amazing, colorful magnificence of the original building's interior. The Great Hall was restored, the north staircase reopened, the double-staircase in the south reopened and restores, the colonnades restored, the vaulting in the galleries revealed, the windows reopened, and the fourth floor skylights reinstalled. Full circulation on the first three floors was also restored. Most significantly, the open-air courtyard was covered over to create a new dining and performance space. Although this was not part of the original renovation project, the Smithsonian began considering enclosing the courtyard in 2002. Approval from Congress was secured in August 2003.

The renovation was overseen by architects Warren Cox and Mary Kay Lanzillotta of the D.C. firm of Hartman-Cox Architects. The Kogod Courtyard canopy was designed by the British firm of Foster and Partners in cooperation with the British firm of Buro Happold. Interior and exterior landscaping was designed by the landscape architectural firm of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.

The total cost of the was $283 million -- $166 million in federal money, $38 million in miscellaneous private donations and $25 million from the Kogod family for the courtyard, and $54 million in miscellaneous private donations for preservation of the building.

The Old Patent Office Building reopened in July 2006. The Kogod Courtyard opened in November 2007.

Renovations included the Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium in the basement. The Great Hall was completely restored along with its two mezzanines. The Luce Foundation Center for American Art was built around the circumference of the Great Hall, and on the two mezzanines above it. This new gallery space displays more than 3,300 artworks in secure glass cases, paintings densely hung on screens, three-dimensional art (sculptures, etc.) on shelves, and small artwork (miniatures, medals, jewelry) in pneumatic drawers.

Northwest corner of third floor contains office space for the two museums. But the third and fourth floor mezzanines now house the Lunder Conservation Center -- a space where the public can see artwork being restored and conserved, and where information on art preservation and curation is displayed and provided in computer stations and kiosks. Third floor mezzanine space over the grand double-staircase was also opened creating two new, narrow gallery spaces.

But the most astonishing change was the creation of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard. (Robert Kogod was CEO of the Charles E. Smith Co., a huge real estate development firm in D.C., and his wife Arlene Smith Kogod is heir to the Smith fortune.) To cover the 28,000-square-foot courtyard, a system of eight aluminum columns was built to support the canopy without putting any structural stress on the Old Patent Office Building itself. The canopy is an aluminum grid containing double-glazed glass panels, which appears to float over the courtyard.

Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol designed the new courtyard interior. The grass and pathways were removed, and black granite paving installed. White marble planters on the south and north sides contain ficus and black olive trees, ferns, shrubs, and seasonal plantings. Four water scrims, each a quarter-inch deep, run down the south-center axis.

pantry design ideas, A kitchen pantry cabinet for around $100; tall corner units, natural wood or white storage cabinets with shelves and drawers; low space saver designs; open pantries; pull out styles, antique wooden creations to match your décor; sleek contemporary modular units; lazy Susan units for around $250– where to shop and ideas on how to incorporate this furniture into your overall kitchen design – that’s what we offer this week. It’s not an exciting piece of furniture like a decorative console table for your entryway or an elegant oak dinning table, in fact it’s a rather boring item that, if your kitchen doesn’t have enough cabinet space to store necessities like spices, salt, sugar, flower, rice, pasta or cans of soup and sauces, you may be pulling your hair out in despair after coming home from the grocery store. A pantry, or a kitchen storage unit isn’t sexy; it’s a necessity. About the only interesting part in choosing the design, is deciding what it will look like on the outside, after that it’s practical – will it fit in the corner or can it be mounted to the wall above the counter? Will it hold all the packages of potato chips the kids and their friends will eat during the week? Will it rotate like a lazy Susan or be stationary? Are drawers essential? Should it have pull out sections or will it have just a series of shelves? Can you organize food and packages on open shelves so it doesn’t look cluttered, or is it better to hide groceries and supplies behind closed doors? First let’s take a look at kitchen pantry cabinets from the outer perspective, the shape, size and finishes that will best match what you already have in the kitchen. The options are not as vast as other furniture types….basically they are: natural wood, antique finished wood, wood painted white for a country look, white contemporary laminated finishes or pressboard with laminated artificial wood surfaces. Then you can choose size and height. Counter height or tall; single width or double. A place called One Way Furniture has some of all the main styles and sizes, and Kitchen Source has some incredible Chef Pantry Systems that are so well designed they could easily be part of a professional kitchen. The most fun design is what they call a Jelly Cabinet…..I suppose it’s not because the cabinet is made from jelly but is the right size to store little jars of jelly and jam should you happen to leave near a forest full of berries. The Summerland double door model has two drawers that pull out and are easy glide. There are also two wood doors and the entire unit can be orderedin variety of fun finishes to compliment your kitchen décor, like: Snowflake White, Sage Green, Sunshine Yellow, Radio Flyer Red, Ebony Black or Midnight Blue. These are small pantry storage cabinets that are just 41 inches high and 41 inches wide. Inside, the shelf and drawer offer 18 inch depths. It’s made by the Kush Furniture Company and is part of the Kush Furniture Summerland Group Collection. It costs about $460, so it’s not the cheapest pantry available, but certainly one of the most interesting designs as far as a place to store your food is concerned. Let’s go back and take a second look at the Kitchen Source models called the Chef Pantry System. What’s really great about these units is that they can match your décor because you can choose the Maple hard woods and veneers or Baltic Birch Plywood in white that’s finished with a clear catalyzed coating so it’s easy to clean. The white pantry cabinets in the single door style cost just under $340. The double pantry in Maple is a lot more complex to price. It seems the basic unit costs just over $550, but you can choose a center panel for about $84 and an upper door system for about $156. It’s not entirely clear if the basic units are just the door organizers and you have to add the swivel center panel or if it’s all inclusive. Although the way in which they have been priced separately leads us to believe you can customize the inner area. In the Chef Pantry line there are double pantry systems that are 51.5 inches tall, single pantry systems that are also 51.5inches tall, and a base pantry system that’s just 24 inches high. The first two are easy to understand because one has a single door and the other has two, but the base pantry is an under the counter design that utilizes the inner part of the cabinet as well as the doors for storage. This unit costs about $420 and again it seems that the center panel is sold separately and costs about $56. Completely different from the classic wood or white pantry cabinets above, is the contemporary Fulterer Pantry Cabinet that has a pull-out system and is very sleek in appearance for a contemporary style kitchen. The Fulterer system comes in silver, chrome and white and is a sort of basket organizer that is installed to create pull out pantry cabinets. If this sounds rather confusing, then you know how we feel. We really love the idea of this unit…but…..although it looks really practical here’s the problem: The units are sold as a 3, 4 or 5 basket set that includes gliders and tracks and frame mounts, but it seems the cabinet itself isn’t included, although the system is called a cabinet. For example the 5 basket design, which costs almost $800 (and each set of two metal baskets cost between $200 and about $340), yet there’s no cabinet. So, although we understand that the kits with baskets come with mounting brackets and tracks and gliding systems and a few wire baskets, it seems to be a very expensive organizing system because above all the costs just quoted you still need the actual cabinet into which this system must be installed. The product descriptionsays: “Set includes pull-out frame, top and bottom slide, baskets, door brackets and instructions” ….clearly the doors are not included. So I need to buy a cabinet that has doors that can be attached to this system and I can’t find if such a thing exists. In the end, what you need to make this work as it is in the picture, is to buy a freestanding cabinet and install all this as a storage system…..or use a tall empty cabinet that is part of your built-in kitchen counter/cabinet set and refit the guts with this system. This seems really complicated. To keep it simple and affordable, we really love the recessed kitchen cabinet pantry hat has seven shelves and can be ordered in 5 different wood stains like honey, natural wood, colonial, darkmahogany or cherry, and costs under $500 complete…! It’s one of the best tall pantry cabinets available, being over 62 inches high, although it’s not too wide, just 20 inches. You can also choose a door style….so many to choose, like a split door with glass, a solid wood one, a mirrored design for a contemporary look, and even a French style glass squares option. Wood pantry cabinets like this one can also be enhanced with organizing units, but since they have shelves already, you really need nothing more. If you like it, it’s available online at Kitchen Source. A really affordable option for kitchen cabinets pantries designs that are rustic pine with pewter accents is the Ameriwood single door pantry that costs about $185. It’s not a large storage unit, but it has three shelves and is about 60 inches tall, can be set anywhere you have space, doesn’t require being built-in to a cabinet or counter, and offers enough space for essential food storage. We really love this little unit, and suggest it would even be great to buy two and place a low jelly cabinet between them and have a complete system. For much less than the professional systems you can create your own pantry setup. Bradley Brand Furniture has a great cabinet that’s solid lumber oak wood and is totally handmade, available in 6 gorgeous stain options and is not a cheap veneer or particleboard or paneled item like many of the cheap cabinets. This is actually an item to get excited about, even if it will be used as a pantry. It could be the main storage unit for the kitchen as well as a piece of decorative furniture. It’s 72 inches tall and 42 inches wide, so most storage or organizing systems can be installed if you want to have something other than shelves. However, the unit comes with two bottom drawers. It’s not cheap at almost $2,400, but it’s a REAL piece of furniture! If you need affordable white pantry cabinets that are low, the Catskill Cottage Kitchen Accessories collection is a very good option. Take a look at the Davenport unit that comes in eggshell white and cost just $140. This is a genuine solution if you don’t need a large pantry, just some extra space. It’s considered a jelly cabinet, so it only measures 36 inches in height and is 28 inches wide, but it does have 3 shelves built-in and each is 12 inches deep. There’s also a single door design in the same collection that costs just over $100. It’s really funky and they call it The Hobart. It’s also for sale online at Kitchen Source, and if you live in the continental US, shipping is free. If you need quick solutions in veneer and press-board designs that are really cheap, both in white or wood veneer finishes, there are models from $99 to about $250 at Hayneedle in the eKitchen Islands store. They even have some really cheap mission style cabinets to go with your mission furniture, if that is your theme, and the cabinets available cost as little as $130 to $180 and you can choose tall, low or even open designs that are like trolleys and have wheels. Also for about $140 you can get a complete set of cabinets that can be wall mounted. Venture Horizon has a design that’s really practical. If you look closely at the unit, you’ll see that the side panel (which ends up being the front if slid sideways between other furniture or beside a fridge) has a handle. This allows it to be pulled out like the expensive storage units that are on a track. With 6 shelves there’s plenty of room for cans, bottles, spices and even larger boxes and packages that can be fit on the top shelf that’s open. Although it has no doors and is open, it needn’t be a totally open unit. Sliding the pull out pantry cabinets between your built-in counter cabinets, or between a stove or fridge and another closed shelf will allow this pantry to be hidden. An ingenious affordable solution that almost any kitchen can make use of because it comes in both an oak and a white veneer finish. The whole system cost under $130. We think it’s a good value item. While you’re shopping for cabinets and storage systems you may also be interested in a round kitchen table ideas, glass dining table designs or other glass table accents for your home. You can find lots of suggestions and recommendations on these types of home furnishings in related topics. Remember that console table designs, especially thin or narrow mission styles that have shelves and drawers, can be used in the kitchen as extra storage space, as a place to set a microwave, as jelly cabinets, and also as buffets for the dinning area. At Mission Console Table we offer you tips on how to use consoles in unusual ways to save space and also how to find other furnishings you want – from the most innovative designer glass furniture to small decorative hallway accents in antique wood., pantry design, kitchen

Day #38

www.132daysofdarkness.com

Jeff was on another angry streak. It was the worst one since the month following Dad’s departure. It had been 7 years without him now and even though it hurt us all, Jeff was the only one still making a fuss about it. He was 17 for god sake, throwing tantrums like a constipated kid. It was really a sight. He yelled and screamed and cried and licked the snot off of his upper lip. I always wanted to film him freaking out, but our family 8mm took off with Dad and my part-time job mowing lawns only paid enough for mower maintenance and gas. How sweet it would have been though to project all 6’2 of Jeff onto the auditorium walls for all the kids he bullied to enjoy. With or without embarrassment, Jeff would eventually learn his lesson, but for now he was just one angry son of a bitch.

It was a particularly bad day for Jeff. The night before, he wrecked his car going head to head with some greasers in a Century after they revved on him. The confrontation began while out cruising Van Nuys and ended when Jeff lost it on the take off and whipped it into the curb. He broke the front axle and bent the frame; front corner panel was toast too. The next morning he had to catch the bus to school. He missed the 7:50 pick-up and was late to first period P.E. As punishment Coach Gunny made him come back during lunch and run laps. He quit after two and a half and walked up the bleachers towards the shade. He reached the top and rounded the announcer’s booth only to see Mandy Romero, the girl he’d been crushing on since September, making out with some guy who he swore was queer. To top off the day, he got chewed out by Mr. Copley, the new vice dean of students who had just moved here from the outback’s of Australia, or so we joked, for smoking in the locker-room.

I saw him walking up to the house. Mom was outside gardening and I was washing my grandma's car, a butter cream yellow 1950 Merc. "Jeffrey, Mr. Copley called today", Mom said with a cigarette dangling from the side of her mouth. "Yeah, and? You can't make me quit, you'd be a hypocrite." "Quit? Why would I make you quit? You need to be in school. Mr. Copley informed me you’re in danger of flunking the 11th grade. He recommended you stay for some of the after school study sessions in the library. It sounded like he was really concerned." Jeff scoffed. "Are you kidding me? Why would I willingly go to detention? Fuck Mom, are you that stupid?" Mom cussed more than any of us, but always acted surprised when we let it slip in front of her. "Jeffrey!" She shook her head. " Mom! God, Mr. Copley doesn't give two shits about me. He chewed me out once today and now he's calling my house, trying to bother me here too? Why can’t he just leave me alone?" Jeff was in many ways the man of the house since dad left and always called it "his house", in the way a homeowner would. "Jeffrey, I think you should give it a chance." "Oh so you’re on his side, huh Mom? You're gunna just believe that kangaroo fucker over your own son? Is that it Ma? Is that it?" All the while I had been laying low behind the Merc, enjoying the show from a safe distance. Jeff was so predicable. His hands for instance; they were balled into fists. Whenever he got tense he'd clinch his fists and start hitting anything with in arms reach. Usually it was the wall or the desk in our bedroom, but the more spectacular times included the front porch windows, all three of them, the particleboard door in the pantry, he left a big ol’ hole in that, and the finale the neighbors dog. Yup, he punched the neighbors dog straight in the mouth after it pissed on his catchers glove. I egged him on most of the time, but paid the price for it too. More often than not he'd catch me and lump me up pretty good. The Charlie-horses and monkey bumps wouldn’t loosen up for days. I couldn’t help myself though. I thought his little tantrums were hilarious, I still do.

Mom and Jeff were still going at it and creating quite a scene. I saw him move closer to mom, towering over her by nearly a foot. "Jeffery, calm down. The neighbors are staring." She smiled and waved to Fran, the nosey fat lady who lived across the driveway from our small bungalow. "God I hate you. You're the worst fucking mother in this entire city. No wonder dad left you." I had heard enough and started to cross the grass towards them. The running hose had made it soppy and muddy and I hated that feeling. "Yeah well he left you too Jeff. Must not have impressed him that much either." "Ah go fuck yourself." He knew he had gone too far, but when Jeff freaked out, he couldn't control his words or actions. You could see in his eyes that he was conscious of his irrationality, but being aware didn't stop him. Mom stared at him. "What Mom, WHAT? ... SAY SOMETH.." She slapped him. She slapped him good and hard and slapped him like he had never been slapped before. Fran ran inside to call the cops. Jeff clinched his jaw. He panted like an running asthmatic and held his eyes open so wide that even from a distance I could see the veins that held them inside their sockets. It had never happened before, but I knew it was going to happen now. Jeff cocked back and hit mom, square on the chin with a left hook. She fell, spinning on her way down, sending her pearl necklace and golden heart hairpin flying through the air, staining the lace around the neck of her blouse as she hit the soggy grass and curled up in agony. I ran, and Jeff was waiting for me with his fists up. I avoided him, ducked under two of his wide swings and headed straight for mom. The rage had taken Jeff at this point. I saw the coward in him come out through his glare, but his hubris was in control now and no matter how cowardly he felt in his core, a flow of prideful magma had hardened around it, suffocating any chance of decency arising. I tried to reason with this rock, "Jeff its over. Just get away from her, Just fucking get away." He lurked closer, still under the influence. "Jeff the cops are coming. I fucking hear their sirens man. If you're here when they show up you can bet you'll be spending the night in Van Nuys." He grinned and said, "Ain't nothing new to me." He was within arms reach now and I knew he'd hit either me or Mom, so I stood up and prepared to take the blow. I put my fists up and so did Jeff. He came straight for me and I jumped to the right. He came at me again and I jumped to the left. He came at me a third time and before I could jump Mom hit him across the head with a shovel. I locked eye’s with him as he collapsed, and in his descent I saw remorse. Mom saw it too and even though her cheek was red and her lips were fat and bloody, she forgave him and blamed the real monster, Dad. The cops ended up stopping by, but Jeff's antics were nothing new. When they saw him out cold on the front lawn they winked at us and kept on driving. Mom went inside and started dinner and I turned off the hose and put away the shovel. I finished up with Grammies Merc and helped Jeff off the grass before calling it a night.

The protective particleboard starts to come off the windows as Kalamazoo begins to relax after Black Lives Matter protests earlier in the month.

June 14, 2020

124 West South Street

Kalamazoo, Michigan

Looking northeast.

The molds are built from melamine-coated particleboard, the corners sealed with neat fillets of silicone caulk. The melamine is pretty slick, but we also used paste wax as a release agent, to keep the concrete from sticking.

SOLD

Very great display piece.

Measurements: 68W 20D 76H

There are two hutches available, which are exactly alike. This is a very great item and a very large piece. The top piece sits on the bottom and can be removed if desired and more importantly it can be moved in two pieces. The bottom piece has 4 drawers for storage and a four door cabinet for more storage. There is one fixed shelf behind the doors. Base top to first shelf is 12 inches. It is painted a very, very subtle pink, so subtle at first glance it looks cream and sealed with a clear, flat lacquer. This is a solid wood piece, no veneer, particleboard, fiberboard (MDF), or plywood. The back boards are painted cream. The pink is so subtle the entire piece looks cream. So it is painted in a two tone. On the back of each shelf is a plate rail. This could be a great piece in a kitchen, an office, a bedroom or a living room. It is wonderful for display or a bookcase. Lots of storage underneath and in the drawers.

With help, I stood the pieces up on their long, straight edges, removing the particleboard bottoms of the molds. We then scooted each vertically-oriented slab to the opposite side of its support frame. replaced the mold bottom on the other side of it, laid down strips of insulation foam and gingerly set the slabs down on these spongy supports. The concrete is still fragile, and I don't want to risk setting them down on rigid surfaces yet.

Here I put too many screws into the edge of the particleboard mold bottom, splitting it at the corner and lifting the inside surface of the mold. The corner of the counter, as a result, will drop off a bit. Thankfully it's in a forgiving spot.

by my side Skinner08

This vintage desk is modeled on the "tanker" style invented by the U.S. Navy in the 1940s. The design is still in use today--and in many cases the actual desks are still in use today--because they are nigh indestructible. No need to struggle with the Ikea hex key instructions that require a working knowledge of string theory, only to have your particleboard masterwork sag under the weight of your iPad after 6 months. Save money, go green, and get vintage!

Width 122cm, depth 76cm, height 75cm

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another pretty blank *so far* advertising space ... this one inside a construction walkway on Main Street. Right before I took the picture a kid slapped that green sticker up there on that poster.

Downtown Los Angeles, CA

This story actually happened two nights ago, but it's taken us awhile to write it out; also, we don't have a proper photo for it, so I'm using this map of the bay instead. Mosquito Bay is on the south side of the island of Vieques. It's a really long story, too, but I hope it's interesting.

In any case, 7:45 Monday night found Katy and I sitting on kayaks in the middle of Mosquito Bay under a cloud-dappled night sky, splashing our hands through warm waters which glowed brightly through our fingers. This bay is one of a handful around the world which are home to permanent colonies of phosphorescent dynoflagellates, microorganisms which bioluminesce when agitated; Mosquito Bay is said to have the largest concentration in the world, creating swirling maelstroms of pale blue light around any disturbance in the water, and we were taking an organized night tour of the bay. Our paddle strokes flashed and sparked, and at one point a fish skimmed past our kayak, leaving a fizzing contrail of light behind it. Later, when our tour group was anchored to a buoy, Katy even joined the rest of the tour in plunging into the bay, becoming instantly enveloped in a shimmering cloud, her slightest motion transcribed in light.

Needless to say, it was an extraordinarily memorable, sublime experience, but I don't believe it would be an exaggeration to say that it pales to insignificance beside the story of the magnificently sketchy process which brought us to the middle of that bay. The evening began innocently enough, when we asked our hostess at the hotel, a truly wonderful woman with wild white hair and a distracted disposition, how we would go about touring the bioluminescent bay. She graciously leapt to our assistance and made the arrangements for our tour by phone, all while repeatedly trying and failing to pour herself a cup of coffee from an empty carafe.

She told us we'd be picked up by the tour operator, Anastasio, at six pm, and indeed, at 6:20 on the dot, a dilapidated blue van rumbled to a stop in front of the hotel. The girl in the passenger seat was unable to slide the side door open from the inside, however, and directed Katy to help by prying at the far edge of the door while she pushed from her side. When this also failed to work she got out of the car and tried again, unsuccessfully, to open the door. At this point the driver, a teenage girl whom Anastasio would later fondly refer to as his son, came around the van and, deftly placing a hand in either side of the door, expertly levered it open.

Made nervous by the awkward delay, Katy and I quickly climbed into the van, and so it was not until we were fully inside that we paused to take stock of its contents. As our eyes adjusted to the gloom we saw two bucket seats, each of which had originally graced the interiors of entirely different vehicles, arranged in a kind of loose curve facing toward the sliding door, their yellow foam bulging proudly through threadbare upholstery. These were followed closely behind by a small red bench seat at the back of the van, whose springs would later prove to have long since lost their buoyancy. This relatively conventional seating was augmented by an upturned plastic crate squeezed behind the driver's seat and a rusty spare tire with a cushion on it which sat on the floor by the door.

As for the rest of the interior, the van looked more or less as though someone had rubbed a steak over the walls, then locked a bear inside. The console against the right wall was entirely destroyed, with only a few pieces of particleboard and vinyl remaining as a grisly reminder. The walls had at some point been covered with a light brown fabric the texture of burlap, which was now stained and tattered; entire portions were supported solely by strips of lathe screwed into the sheet metal. Similar strips were used to hold up the distended brown ceiling fabric, which had separated entirely from the ceiling and now hung in voluptuous folds across the width of the car, rubbing our heads affectionately.

We took our seats at the back as the engine roared to life, filling the van with the overwhelming smell of exhaust fumes, and we bounced across the length Vieques to the upscale end of the island. The van stopped beside a small knot of spandexed tourists and we were finally introduced to Anastasio, who exuberantly flung open the door and greeted us warmly; behind him the tourists' bored expressions were turning to horrified disbelief.

Anastasio quickly ushered most of the group into the van, filling it to its improvised capacity of 8 (the cushioned tire accommodated two), and we continued on. Introductions were hastily made all around, and we all laughed nervously about the van's decrepit condition, joking, when we turned down a narrow, densely wooded dirt track, about this being one of those movies where no one comes back alive. There was a thoughtful pause at this, followed by an uneasy silence while our young driver maneuvered around the enormous craters and gullies which comprised the roadbed.

We finally arrived at one of several small docks jutting through the mangroves into the bay, and were soon rejoined by Anastasio with a trailer of kayaks. He and his assistants launched us into the bay, then told us to wait there while more of our group arrived. This gave us ample time to observe the other tours which were already departing from the neighboring docks, and which seemed somewhat better organized. One group, for example, had evidently each been assigned numbers beforehand, and their guide called them together by this number before they left, his strong, clear voice carrying confidently across the water. This was comforting while it lasted, but soon the groups were all gone and we were left drifting silently beside the shadowy mangroves.

Eventually we were joined by our guide, Javier, a man we'd not met before getting in the water and who turned out to not speak any English. Luckily one of our group was able to translate his announcement that he would keep us together by periodically calling out "ding ding", to which we should all reply, as a group, "ding ding". So we finally set off across the bay, its dark water shimmering in our wake, surounded by a hoarse, echoing chorus of "ding ding".

When we reached a buoy near the middle of the bay, Javier tied our boats together and announced, through his volunteer translator, that this was a bioluminescent bay, and that the light came from microorganisms. When it became apparent that this was all he had to say on the subject, the translator offered some additional information of her own, and other members of the group submitted what facts they'd read beforehand. Then Javier said it was time for swimming, which is where we began our story.

After the kayaking we were ushered back into the van and driven back toward our hotel without further excitement, although the first pair to be dropped off were unable to slide the van's stubborn side door closed, so Anastasio's daughter suggested they just leave it open to help us get more fresh air. It did help clear the exhaust fumes, not to mention letting us more quickly leap out when we reached the foot of our hotel's hill, assuring them that this was close enough before hurrying up the hill to safety.

So, that's the story of our transcendent experience in Mosquito Bay, and the much more worldly adventure which surrounded it.