Chapter 20: Dearly Beloved,...

Despite their conjugal visit, Elspeth and Trip were not engaged. Promised would be a better word. Elspeth spent the holiday in Boston, then the next two months preparing Dr. Richards for the primary. By that time, Trip had been to California and built his project. While there, he had spent some time with an assortment of girls and women. Elspeth never learned the details, but it was arranged by Francine Martel. Dr. Richards believed it involved some professional sex workers, doing pro-bono work on an interesting project. Elspeth felt less jealous than she expected.

The primary was anti-climactic, but Elspeth soon had her hands full of cable programs getting ready to shoot shows at Cloudrest. Almost as soon as the structural and demolition work was complete, there were major decisions to make. A big one involved walls. None of the original plaster could be saved, so all of the walls were removed. Some would stay gone, opening the floor plan. Others were roughed out, ready for new plaster.

That was the issue. Painting fresh plaster was at least as old as Rome. Since new plaster walls were going up, would frescoes on the wet plaster be allowed? David Bromstad was already involved in the project and he was a nationally known artist who was willing to try a new medium. Elspeth allowed him to do a test painting on one small face. She sent a pic of the wall to Dr. Richards, who OKed the rest. More than a dozen followed within a week.

The floorboards were hand-cut and over 200 years old. Removing a century of grime had uncovered some spectacular inlay designs built into the floor. Should they be sanded for refinishing? Complicating the decision were numerous patches of newer wood, sometimes for damage, but more often where a plaster wall was removed and new flooring was needed. Reluctantly, after consultation with Dr. Richards, Sheila Richards, and the Amish with woodworking skills, Elspeth gave the go-ahead.

This was the pattern for the coming months. On one side Dr. Lu, the Dean of Yale’s School of Architecture and the listed architect, occasionally had input. Much more often, the day’s questions came from the construction firm, via Larry Cox or James Maneeson. On the other side were the needs of the many cable show crews. Less often, but with increasing regularity, comments, requests, or questions came from outside, particularly companies interested in buying hardwood.

A typical morning would start with determining how much of the previous day timber could be released for firewood. That pile was divided into salable and stockpile. Next came the discussions of the next day’s timber cutting. These could be difficult since some of the trees were two hundred years old and could take out many other trees when felled. Throughout, there was the current day’s work to supervise. Intermixed would be squabbles over access to the electrical generators, the high-pressure-air lines, priority for anything―eg the big saws, air-powered tools, cured wood, wood curing space, etc.―and purchasing requests. Then, the contestants for the design show arrived.

HGTV had a long history of design shows. The first season of Design Star was won by the same David Bromstad who did the many frescoes around the house. He would MC the new season, which would use the various bedrooms, parlors, and utilitarian rooms of the house as episodes of the competition.

For example, the first episode had the contestants furnishing and decorating the kitchen and pantry. Before the program, the kitchen contained an LP gas stove, a modern wood burning stove and wood box, a large stone floor sink, and a stainless-steel triple sink. Off to one side were two bare rooms for storage and a walk-in refrigerator and freezer. Also available for the contestant’s use were a butcher-block slab and 40 feet of countertop granite.