Ever get that queasy feeling in your stomach, like "oh man, what did I do that for?" Well, I had that today as I walked around the back side of Slum and Blight and took some detail photos. I can see it all in my mind of how it will look, but it is hard to see through the scariness, if you know what I mean. Greg and I went to test drive luxury cars right after I took these photos to get the taste of what we will be missing for the next 10-15 years!
So this view is one of the scariest. I kind of wonder how much longer that crumbling wall on the right is going to support the building. If that goes, the building will just fall right down...luckily, we are insured. The red plywood door there to the right, conveniently located right below the door to nowhere is the entrance to the man cave that has been home to the building's previous owner low these many years. Underneath the lovely red asphalt shingling are the original clapboards, which will make the back of this old building look a lot less scary when removed. I envision a big glass door and window where the man cave entrance sits right now and a wonderful trade sign hanging from the corner of the first floor, enticing walkers to visit whatever shop happens to be in the lower retail space. Perhaps a woodworking studio, or perhaps a potter's lair would work best. I literally have no idea of the structure of this lower portion of the building, or even what is behind that what looks like a beige stucco wall. Maybe an original brick foundation wall that could be saved and exploited for its charm??? More likely, it is an unstable and crumbling foundation that will need to be replaced and painted on the exterior with a happy mural of vines and flowers.....(work with me here, ok??)
With my incredible sense of where my thumb is, I snapped this photo of the parking lot. Our line runs from about where I am standing, left to the other side of the John Deere, straight back to that copse of trees directly behind the trailers to the road. It is a huge lot when you consider that there are two 18 wheeler trailers, four cars and a John Deere tractor in the lot with enough room to spare for an SUV to pass. Hopefully by next Friday, all this will be gone...though the previous owner does have until April 1 to remove everything (the trailers were not there when we bought the building, so they have to leave by Friday. I'll be at a symposium on brown furniture in Delaware until Friday morning, but I will be thinking about this mess!!!!
The back of Slum and Blight's biggest attraction from the front (for me at least) is quite a bit smaller in surface than the other side, making the shed deceptively small. The back side is about 40% smaller than the front because it was built on a slant. The back side is also covered in this gorgeous metal siding that must be hiding all sorts of great stuff. I can envision a wall of glass here with a nice porch that would accomodate those retail spaces on the inside. We would love to consider a restaurant space here, but feel that it might be too risky for us to commit to that. We would be better served for ourselves by putting in two retail spaces with entrances both on Cross Street, facing Main Street and on this side, so customers could get to the parking lot, where more shops might await their pleasure.
(Please pay no attention to that index finger in the photo)
So that is my scary novella for the day. Happy Slum and Blight to you all!
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