On August 24, 2010, Central City Millworks received a Gold Medal Building of America Award for our historic renovation of Andrew Wilson Elementary School at 3617 General Pershing in New Orleans:

We are pleased to announce that from hundreds of submissions in your region, Andrew Wilson School has been selected to win a Gold Medal Building of America Award and is scheduled to be a featured case study on the Building of America homepage. Your company has been referred by HMS Architects, Inc. as one of the most reliable team members behind the project’s success….

The Building of America Network showcases the most innovative, unique and challenging new projects — projects that are particularly noteworthy and/or give back to their respective communities.

This historic school was damaged during Hurricane Katrina, and the existing structure was completely renovated by the New Orleans division of Walton Construction, ranked among the top contractors in the United States by Engineering News Record.

Central City Millworks was selected to supply the millwork (interior historic school house doors with transoms, interior windows, molding, hardware, miscellaneous millwork, and all finish installations), and proved instrumental in the completion of projects on schedule and within budget.

The images below are part of a slideshow that highlights this and other historic preservation projects that we have completed:

In their Fall 2009 issue of the AIALA News, the association stated:

The primary concern in the gallery design was to highlight historic elements, while providing a clean, crisp surface on which to display artwork. Retention revelation of masonry walls and wood columns provide the unique sense of time and place in New Orleans, while new materials create an understated drama in which to showcase installations.

The main gallery features floating gypsum display walls: Existing masonry is exposed along the top, bottom, and sides, adding perceived spatial depth and the impression that the gallery itself may be an installation. Concealed lighting runs above a knife-edged cove, with a recessed track below. Existing heavy timber columns—once an elevator shaft—are a focal point at the entry: stretched Dacron sail material between the columns is backlit for dramatic effect from the street.

A seamless, poured resin floor knits all programmatic elements together, flowing continuously throughout the space. At the passageway between old and new galleries, a surround of backlit resin panels signals a transition, contrasting against the weight of the exposed masonry wall and smooth gypsum. Sliding translucent panels provide privacy for support spaces (without adding visual weight to the gallery) and reinforce spatial continuity.

The Port Sulphur Government Building received significant damage during hurricane Katrina in 2005, and renovations began in 2007. The architect selected for this renovation was Yeates & Yeates Architects, LLC. and the job was awarded to DBR/ DRC General Contractors. Central City Millworks, a New Orleans millworks company, was chosen as the contractor, and began production in early 2008.

After a long shop drawing process we were finally able to capture and portray the vision of the architect.  Upon approval we were ready to begin the project.  We first removed every window sash in the building.  59 windows! We brought them back to our New Orleans mill shop, stripped, repaired, patched, primed and sometimes fabricated replacements for each window.  The sashes were then upgraded to a storm rated safety plate glass, glazed in the traditional manner, and reinstalled in full working condition.

Following the window repairs, we began making new storm shutters for every opening, including some of the doors.  We ended up fabricating 64 shutters in total.  These were made to replicate the nonstandard, yet original shutters that were previously on the building.  Unfortunately there were no shutters left to use as a sample, hence the reason for the lengthy shop drawing process.  So much is the case for most of the detail work on this project.

Other missing items that we had to replicate included the front doors and an oculus.  The front doors were especially difficult because the shop drawings came directly from the blueprints from which the building was originally built.  Typically exterior doors nowadays measure 1 ¾” in thickness, but this one measures 2 1/8” thick.  In addition, the panel edges and the rails were on different planes of the stiles.  We constructed them in a very nontraditional way so much so that we can only wonder if the original door were even built exactly like those original plans. Regardless, we figured it out and were able to please two architects in the process!

The palladium transom is right above the doors in the center of the photo

The palladium transom above the doors was originally not included in the bid, but the decision was made for us to fabricate a new transom from white oak to better match the doors.  Well, we ended up not only making a new transom, but we made it to fit the original glass sizes.  This meant that we had to include all of the imperfections of the original and truly recreate it exactly like the original. Needless to say it was very fun…. and challenging.

Please enjoy the following posts and photos of our millwork job in Port Sulphur:

White Oak Paneled Lobby
Custom Cabinet Pass Through
Attic Oculus
Custom Entry Cabinet

Central City Millworks created this custom pass through window

Additional Port Sulphur Blog Posts:

Central City Millworks Completes Port Sulphur Government Building
White Oak Paneled Lobby
Attic Oculus
Custom Entry Cabinet

We used our CNC router to create this counter

The counter from the front

Additional Port Sulphur Blog Posts:

Central City Millworks Completes Port Sulphur Government Building
White Oak Paneled Lobby
Custom Cabinet Pass Through
Attic Oculus

Additional Port Sulphur Blog Posts:

Central City Millworks Completes Port Sulphur Government Building
White Oak Paneled Lobby
Custom Cabinet Pass Through
Custom Entry Cabinet

Front door of the Port Sulphur Government building from the lobby

White oak panels

Detail of corner

Central City Millworks also refurbished every window in the building

Project Manager Johnathan Anselmo

Additional Port Sulphur Blog Posts:

Central City Millworks Completes Port Sulphur Government Building
Custom Cabinet Pass Through
Attic Oculus
Custom Entry Cabinet

View across the American Room at WW II Museum

CCM Achieves Victory in Completing the WWII Museum Millwork Job

High-fives erupted in CCM’s office last summer when we learned we had been awarded the WW II Museum millwork contract. After the initial euphoria subsided, the reality of our immense challenge set in.

Central City Millworks, LLC teamed up with Hal Collums Construction LLC to bid on the fabrication and installation of custom architectural millwork for the extensive WW2 Museum expansion scheduled to open November 7th, 2009. Earlier in the year CCM had worked with Satterfield and Pontikes (one of the leading construction companies in the Gulf Coast region) to fabricate and install the millwork for the Saint Bernard Middle School.

After the initial euphoria subsided, the reality of our immense challenge set in

When the WW II Expansion project was announced and the plans by Voorsinger and Mathes Architects became available, we were pleased to learn that S&P was preparing a bid. The CCM estimating group worked with S&P for several months to develop a competitive bid for the WW2 Expansion including refining the bid with three addenda. All the hard work finally paid off with a phone call from S&P letting us know they had selected us as their millwork provider.

We succeeded in meeting our National WW II Museum challenge by delivering millwork that one of the project architects described as “fabulous”.

Now that we had the job and had mobilized our design and production departments, we started focusing on the obstacles. We realized that estimating the WW2 job would be complicated and technically challenging. And it became obvious that there were tremendous design challenges that had to be solved to accomplish the architect’s vision.

Plans show a millwright what the architect’s intentions were aesthetically, however it is the millwright’s responsibility to design cabinets, for instance, to meet the aesthetic goals while overcoming the structural and material challenges. We had to completely ramp-up our shop drawing department and our CAD design department before we could put this job into design production. Not only would we need to hire additional CAD designers but we also needed to increase our level of expertise with our CNC router. All these challenges seemed daunting, but failure was not an option. Our team understood this was a legacy job and that we had to be victorious for ourselves, our company, and our city.

Millwork at National WW2 Museum bar

Last week Central City Millworks succeeded in meeting our National WW II Museum challenge by delivering millwork that one of the project architects described as “fabulous”. Working as a team with Satterfield & Pontikes and many other great local and regional subcontractors, we delivered a new landmark to New Orleans.

This museum expansion is a new jewel in the crown of the tourism industry of New Orleans. CCM is proud of the role it played in ensuring victory for New Orleans and the New Orleans Tourism Industry.