Newtown, Bucks County
Exterior painting in Newtown, PA.
For a painter, this is two places: a borough of Queen Anne and Gothic Revival frame whose review board leaves color alone, and a township of 1980s and 1990s houses with a historic district and rules of its own.
Exterior painting for Newtown homes
Three-quarters of the buildings in the 1986 extensions of the borough's historic district are frame, most of them two and a half stories and three to five bays wide. Queen Anne houses there carry projecting dormers, porches with turned posts and, on North Lincoln Avenue, round three-story turrets; Gothic Revival houses bring steep roofs, front cross gables and bracketed cornices cut with scrollwork. It is a town of painted wood.
The borough's Historical Architectural Review Board does not review colors for any project, so a Victorian scheme can be rethought. It does review repair that is not in kind and replacement with something new, and its standing advice is to repair windows, siding, porches and balustrades whenever possible and replace in kind when not. For a painter, that means mending wood rather than covering it.
Newtown
Turrets and scrollwork in the borough, newer houses around it
More than half of the borough's homes predate 1940. Washington Avenue's spacious Victorians sit back behind front yards, and Gothic Revival houses add arched windows under their steep roofs. Round turrets and scroll-cut cornices take the longest to prepare, because every curve and cut edge holds water, and that is where paint tends to lift.
The township is the opposite: about eight in ten of its homes were built in 1980 or later, and only three in a hundred before 1940. It keeps its own historic district under its own ordinance, where alterations need a Certificate of Appropriateness from the Board of Supervisors, so its rules, not the borough's, apply to a house on that side of the line.
Worth knowing
Which side of the line
The borough and the township share a name but not their rules. Knowing which one a house sits in comes before the color card.
Houses at the sidewalk
Around Court Street, the oldest core, town houses stand right at the sidewalk. Ladders and drop cloths share the space with people walking by, and the work is planned around them.
Two-over-two sash
The Italianate houses scattered through the borough have two-over-two sash under big bracketed cornices. Old wood sash like that is scraped, primed and painted rather than replaced.
The work
How an exterior goes
The same care on every job, in every town. The full guide to exterior painting.
Every side, walked
Randy walks every side of the house with you, because the south wall and the north wall rarely need the same work. Both the walkthrough and the written estimate are complimentary.
Causes first
Where paint is peeling to bare wood, the source of the water is found and dealt with. Soft, rotted wood is repaired or replaced, because no paint holds on wet or decayed wood.
Washing
Dirt, mildew and chalk are washed off at a pressure that cleans without gouging the grain. The siding then dries completely before any primer or paint goes on.
Scraping and priming
Loose and flaking paint is scraped back to a firm edge. Bare wood is primed promptly, before the sun has time to weaken its surface.
Caulk where water gets in
Open joints where trim meets siding and around windows are caulked, and holes are filled. The bottom edges of lap siding are left open on purpose, so water can drain out and the boards can dry.
Paint in the right conditions
Finish coats go on when the temperature will hold for the paint, away from walls baking in full sun, and early enough to set before the evening dew. On most days that means following the shade around the house.
Questions
Exterior painting, Newtown.
Our house is in Newtown Township's historic district. Can we repaint it a new color?
Ask the township first. Its historic preservation ordinance exempts painting in kind, meaning the same color, from the certificate process; a color change is not on that exempt list, so the township should confirm before the paint is chosen.
What makes a Queen Anne turret harder to paint than a flat wall?
Its height and its curve. On a three-story turret the top courses take the most weather, the staging has to follow the round, and every board and trim piece up there gets the same scraping and priming as the ones by the front door.
A turned post on our borough porch has rotted. Can it be replaced?
In the borough, replacing it in kind, with a post of matching material and profile, is not something the review board looks at; a different material or design is. A post with rot only at its base can often be repaired, and a full replacement is primed on every face before it goes in.
More in Newtown
Other services here.
- Level 5 drywall finishA skim coat over the entire surface, for walls that hold up under raking light and dark paint.
- Skim coatingRough, patched or uneven walls resurfaced smooth, often after wallpaper comes down.
- Plaster repairCracked, loose and failing plaster in older homes, repaired and made sound.
- Interior paintingWalls, ceilings, trim, doors and millwork, prepared properly and finished clean.
- Drywall installation & repairNew drywall hung, taped and finished; cracks, holes and water damage repaired invisibly.
- Drywall texture matching & removalTexture matched so repairs disappear, applied where you want it, or taken off for a smooth wall.
- Popcorn ceiling removalOld acoustic texture taken down and the ceiling finished smooth.
- Wallpaper removalOld wallpaper and wall linings stripped without tearing up the wall beneath.
- Wood stainingDecks, porch floors, doors and trim, inside and out, stained by hand.
Consultation
Request a private consultation.
Private walkthrough & written estimate, complimentary. Tell us a little about the house and the rooms, and Randy will be in touch to arrange a time.
- Hours
- Monday – Friday8:30 AM – 5:30 PMSaturday10 AM – 3 PMSundayClosed
- Service area
- Easton, Bethlehem, Allentown and the greater Lehigh Valley; Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
Fully insured — proof on request. Residential and commercial.