^{Taking care of our Casa Marina}

The Roof  of our old beach sauna needed attention and care. Old bricks out of clay on the roof had given up and something had to be done. The old roof material was not ideal for this windy place, with a lot of pine trees. It was a big mess under the roofing bricks. Lot of moss and needles of pine trees where underneath the roofing bricks. Two layers of good quality roofing felt made with traditional way is going to be the new roof type. This is how it’s going to be!

We also took the opportunity to convert the sixty year old sauna to today´s standards. I like to plan carefully a reparation project so that I also get something new with the same effort. Not just to make things as they used to be. The beach sauna is very old and it is made of more than a hundred years old stocks that are hand carved. The timber and the design is unique. One must be careful with every change you make so that it fits the old looks and ideas of that beautiful old beach sauna.

We had to construct a working platform in order to reach the roof from underneath. The beach house is situated on the cliffs and over the sea. I had a master plan that we make new beams for the terrace long enough to support our working platform. Now we can use a standard aluminium working platform with wheels. We can easily move the working platform and nearly “walk on the water”. What is the best part is that we get a new and wider terrace with the same time. Better and more safe also.

For the construction of the working “platform” ie. terrace we use impregnated timber on the new beams. The  removal of the old  constructions underneath the terrace planks was bigger job than to build the whole new terrace flooring. We attach new beams to the existing  girders that lay on the big bearer across the whole house width. The big bearer is anchored to the cliff with concrete posts.

Laying the new roofing felt with grey colour, that brings together the surrounding nature and the building itself. We have a strong advise to use premium quality roofing felt from our master roof maker. He also recommended painted steel railing edges to lead the water away from the wooden constructions. Both the gabel ends and the roof ends are now sheltered from the water. We have a team of three builders, master roof maker, young power and a senior member, that tries to deliver goods up on the roof. We must admit, we used a steel horse also to get the job done effectively.

The master roofmaker took very srickt concern of the fire protection that is essential under the whole roof project. We had two separate water pipe systems down to the beach sauna and at least ten big fire extinguishers. The work proceeded without any hazards. Now we have two layers of premium grade roofing felt glued with fire torchp, to the roof and with each other.  Good old method but a bit hazardous with the open fire.

Chimney, a project totally of its own The old chimney was surveyed and the upper brick layers where totally loose. The old copper plates at the root of the chimney made a good shelter to the chimney itself and the briks where as new under the copper plates. Good for us! Let´s go to the work, we still have the small payloader to take the scrap down and mortar and new tiles up.

The heavy metal musician brick layer and the senior concrete boat builder found directly common interests on the subject. Many thoughts arouse of burning the limestone in Portland, England and also here in Parainen. Parainen has one of the biggest open pit mines for lime stone in Europe. Portland 5 is the concept and “the mother of all the cement inventions” . It took us one long day to get the job done, this time no laser nor the alining line was needed. Only level. The two cement professionals where devoted to the work.

A lot Construction details had to be solved in this project. Bad parts had to be cut off. Tar on the joinery of the big bearer and beams, tar also on the edge of the wooden roof area. Many bolted joints and wood joining works.  High altitude working space needs safe working platform which had to be secured to the flooring beams. A good old finnish “pipo” warming up your head on a cold and windy day.

The terrace railing is to be made out of glass. Glass is not spoiling the looks of an old beach sauna, and it is inconspicuous from the sea. Glasses need some strong stainless steel stanchions, that we order from Germany. The terrace railing is going to get a lot salty spray on it and it needs to be  made out of rust free materials. It is to be seen, who cleans the glasses. Though it will not be a big problem, we hope. At least you can wipe the glasses clean from the terrace, avoiding the cliffs that are dangerously slippery on early spring and rainy autumn days.

Bold sceneries are under our constant notice in this working place. The skies vary here all day long, different every morning and night. You can´t say our working place is dark and dull. Here a few highlights.