There are many reasons why people love old homes. You could narrow them down to three basics: detail, craftsmanship and well-worn materials. When you walk in a home in Brookside, for instance, you get a completely different feel than when you walk in a brand new home in any new neighborhood in the city. You get a sense of the families who have lived there before, a glimpse of the way things were, even an understanding of the lifestyle of the era in which the house was built.

"People love houses that were built 90 to 100 years ago. Why can't we build like that anymore? The materials aren't available," says Mike Dobbs, a local home builder and architectural salvager. "I call myself the anti-Home Depot. I don't mean that begrudgingly, but the products we find are one-of-a-kinds."

He's referring to Seldom Found Architecturals, a showroom and stock yard of salvaged materials that his business partner Matt Rosburg runs in the West Bottoms. With the company started just last year, Rosburg has kept it alive by selling new home builders salvaged flooring for model homes, though he has much more available, including finials, corbels, terra cotta, antique gates, church pews, beams and bricks.

With the materials set out on flats, one might wonder what all the fuss is about. But show them an example of the finished product in a home setting, and you get an "instant feeling of comfort," Dobbs says. His own condo on the Plaza is a veritable showcase of possibilities, from reclaimed oak floors and pine wall paneling to the antique armoire doors on his pantry and the cypress hurricane shutters on his closet doors.

Dobbs has been collecting materials for 30 years, yet he admits that it's becoming more of a challenge to find materials and that the competition is showing up at every tear down. "It's like a giant Easter egg hunt," he says good-naturedly.

Where to find architectural salvage:

Antiques & Oddities Architectural Salvage
2045 Broadway Street, Kansas City, Mo.
816/283-3740

Elmwood Reclaimed Timber
816/532-0300
elmwoodreclaimedtimber.com

Habitat ReStore
816/231-6889
restorekc.org

Seldom Found Architecturals
1107 Hickory in the West Bottoms
seldomfound.com

Buy the Book

According to Jennifer Roberts, author of Redux: Designs that Reuse, Recycle, and Reveal (Gibbs-Smith, $29.95), there are three very good reasons for reusing salvaged materials now:

  • because a 300-year-old redwood, once cut down, is gone for good
  • because we're bulldozing houses before they've outlived their first mortgages and we're burying the stuff they're made of in holes in the ground
  • because some of the new goods we use to build or remodel our homes are of questionable quality at best and poisonous at worst



    "The message for using salvage is simple: don't be afraid if it's not perfect. Remember, there's nothing wrong with something that has a few nicks and scrapes — they only add to the charm." –From Brian D. Coleman, author of Details: How to Design with Architectural Salvage and Antiques (Gibbs-Smith, $21.95)