Appropriate interior wall finish material (1904) carriage house besides plaster?

[SouthBend]

I have a single stall garage/carriage house on our 1904 Queen Anne. I was hoping to finish and insulate the thing even though it is detached and has not been for 117 years. Would like to do it with an appropriate material for the period. I'm fine with expensive options as its maybe something I can piece together over the next few years. Was obviously hoping to stay away from plaster or green board.

Thanks everyone

[Gothichome]

Southbend, good to hear from you. I would put some serious thought into stained ceded or fir tongue and grove, installed on the bias and stained.

[SouthBend]

Yeah decided to take a little break from the house and enjoy the summer, plus my next project is replacing rotten column bases on the porch which had a 8 week lead time.

So you're saying, 1) tongue and groove regardless, 2) Cedar or Fir, 3) On the bias means horizontal? Thanks as always Gothichome

[mjt]

When I hear "on the bias", I think at a 45-degre angle. So, diagonally.

[Gothichome]

Yes, diagonally. It will do two things for you, it will offer support and stiffen up your walls. I believe you mentioned your garage has a slight lean, the angled boards will stop the racking. Also you can be creative with the application, maybe a herring bone pattern. Stain it up to look good. Tongue and groove would be a period construction feature, all be it, a bit of a fancy upgrade for a carriage house

[SouthBend]

We've fixed the lean mostly before I started refinishing the outside but additional support wouldn't hurt.

Not that I'm going for everything to be authentic (especially since carriage houses were unlikely to be finished inside), but in general would diagonal be a common enough layout back then? The garage is a contributing structure to the streets national registry status so even interior doesn't matter I'm still trying to do it justice. Just curious.

I've already gotten rid of the nearly irreparable carriage house doors that had been botched by multiple generations of homeowners inn exchange for a wood garage door so I've already altered it substantially. There were about 6 reasons though why I skewed from accuracy there though.

Aesthetically I like the idea of diagonal/herringbone, but just weighting options out.

[1918ColonialRevival]

Another vote for fir or cedar tongue and groove. Fir will probably be the more cost effective option. This may sound like sacrilege, but I would get paint-grade tongue and groove and put a good primer and paint on it, especially if you plan on using the garage as a workspace. It will brighten it up and make it easier to see what you're doing versus staining it dark. Plus - it's period appropriate as well.

Not to be nit-picky, but I'd bet that garage came 10-15 years after the house. It looks nearly identical to a lot of "plan book" garages from around 1915 or so. Yours was built for an automobile. A carriage house would be taller and wider. Automobiles were high end luxury items in 1904 and not many people had them, but by 1910, they were going mainstream. Seemingly overnight, people starting constructing garages. The earliest garages were virtually identical to carriage houses of earlier, but by the mid 1910s they had evolved into the general design of yours. Some incorporated features such as a floor pit to use when changing oil and doing chassis maintenance to a buried in-ground gas tank, much like those seen on farms.

[SouthBend]

You're probably correct on the age and it being for an automobile. Then again, it's slightly possible it is original to the house in 1904. South Bend is home to Studebaker who built carriages for decades a 5 minutes walk down the road and were making automobiles starting in 1902. The original owners could have built it as a garage, even if it was a future use. A 1904 Studebaker Model C would have cost about $47,000 in today's rate so it's obviously not likely.

The neighborhood is filled with wealthy homes of industrious families like the Studebaker's so maybe it was the original case of keeping up with the Jones's.

Alright so T&G Fir.....vertical, diagonal, herringbone, etc. Painted.

[Gothichome]

Southbend, vertical and horizontal will not provide as much protection against racking as angled. It was built as a garage, most carriage houses in urban situations would have a hay loft, a stable stall and a small grazing field. I do not think your home made allowance for these. But an early adopter of those new angled automobiles would have gladly built a garage for his brand new Studebaker.

[phil]

3/4" edge grain fir T and G in long lengths might be cost prohibitive.
1/4" plywood will do as much for racking.

Im planning to split some old flooring to about 1/4" thic and use that with a profile to the edges like a lap joint. that way I can attach my plywood and then cover it with fir but the fir will only be 1/4" not 3/4". this saves about half the wood cost and the appearance may be exactly as if it were 3/4" fir. I may face nail it somewhat and hide the nails with putty. I can also use Pl glue to bond the fir strips to the plywood.
with my plan, visually it wont be different and I will use a V bead , some has sort of a bump , you'll find some different profiles. I already resized my flooring and remved the T and G to get a pile of lumber I can use. I plan to try splitting it on a bandsaw but i can do it on my tablesaw. the V bead and lap joint will probably be done on a table router. It should end up 1/4" thick or so so that will be fine as the face. th etop edge is going to be covered with a wainscot cap or a shelf. the plywood behind will be hidden and simply something to attach to.

If you can find old wainscot to recycle that may be good but most is painted. if you want to paint it anyway I'd just use MDF, you can get historic profiles. My aim is to show the wood so I want edge grain fir. 100 years ago old growth fir in long lengths and made of old growth edge grain, knot free fir was cheap. It isn't cheap now. to do a whole room in it would cost thousands if you use new wood..

the bias may still be your goal , That's just cosmetic if you put plywood behind. That's how I see it anyway. If you want real cheap use drywall and a wallpaper with a suitable relief pattern and paint it. another option is to use wainscot panels instead of strip wainscot and that can fit the era. Lily had a good idea of just using the strips of fir for the border of panel style wainscot and using something like cork flooring for the filler between the panels. That would save lumber costs.

I'd start with insulation of course.