A Trip to Reuse Depot, Window Work, Hallway Work

Woke up early this morning, for a trek out to Reuse Depot. Liz was looking for some wavy glass to use, for her window resoration project – and the best option was to find some older windows, and to cut the pieces she needed from them.

She’d been out to Reuse Depot on her own before, but we decided to go together to help sort and sift through all the windows they had (note: it was a lot).

One of two cats on the premises. Never learned this guy’s name, but he followed us around for a while.

A lot of windows.

Liz, sorting through some options.

Our feline friend, hanging out wiht us in the back window area.

We asked if it was ok to take these windows outside, to clean them out in the light before we purchased them. We got a raised eyebrow at first, but after hearing why… were told to go right ahead.
Liz brought paper towels and Windex with us (the folks at Reuse Depot were impressed we had our own cleaning supplies), but after a bit… one of the guys gave us this glass cleaner spray. Apparently, it’s better than Windex and leaves no streaks at all.
The reason for all this cleaning: apparently, it’s really hard to tell if there are scratches if the window is dirty. Sometimes you can’t tell until the glass is all cleaned off. So rather than buy these guys and discover this at home, we wanted to clean them her first to inspect them.
The guy who gave us the spray cleaner was really knowledgeable about glass (he used to work with glass professionally), and said that wavy glass is just much softer than regular glass. And prone to scratches. Even if someone took a lot of care in cleaning them, if a rag had some dust or particles on it… over time, those particles could end up causing scratches. Or cause the glass to get dull/cloudy.
The guy helping us was pretty tickled that we were outside the store, cleaning their wares. He took a photo of us working, and said he’d be posting it on their Facebook page (which gave both of us a laugh).

Back inside, by the checkout area.

Detail. For a moment, I thought this figure was part of the Funhouse pinball game.

A cool vending machine, near the entrance: a vintage B/W photo for 50 cents!

A closer look, because this thing was just so cool. I didn’t have any money on me, but love the idea.
The proceeds I think go to a charity, and were to be matched by Reuse Depot. Also, there are some 10% off coupons mixed into the photos, so your 50 cents could also garner a nice discount.
I hate that a lot of vintage shops pluck out photos from albums, and sell them for $1 a pop. But this feels like a better use/approach. I was reminded of how much I like old photos, and how I’d happily spend time getting lost looking at them.

Another look at the various wares at Reuse Depot. Lots of great stuff!

Back home, I started work upstairs while Liz went to work downstairs. I had a pretty modest goal of just getting insulation into the walls.

Liz in the basement, cutting panes of glass down to the sizes she needs.

Upstairs, a bit later. I thought I got everything covered (but realized too late that there’s a small spot by the outlet I missed). Ah well.
Related:
Installing Glass Panes
Covering the Hallway
Chicago Pinball Expo, 2010
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