Rarebird Acquisitions

Revitalizing a piece of PDX History

Preserving the history of a home is really important to us when we renovate. We worked closely with the Oregon State Historic Preservation Office to restore our property on NE 13th Ave in Irvington (The William Anderson House, c. 1898) without sacrificing its antique charms.⠀
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The William Anderson House is one of the last homes in Portland that still shows the original street number on its transom window. The city assigned new addresses to every building in 1931. So, we removed the new screen and cleaned the stained glass to keep the original window and address – saving a little piece of PDX history! ⁠⠀
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All of the original solid-wood, four-panel designed doors with brass hardware were salvaged, cleaned, repaired, and rehung.⁠ In addition, all of the original wood-frame, double-hung windows were retained, making repairs as needed. ⁠⠀
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When we couldn’t salvage original fixtures or finishes, we did our best to use new materials in a way that preserved the historic charm of the home. For example, much of the original crown moulding was missing, inside and out. So, we had custom moulding designed and crafted to restore the home to the way it looked when it was built in 1898.⁠⠀
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We are proud to play a small part in preserving Portland’s history!⁠⠀