Job Springer may not know much about fashion, but his instincts were good when he recently purchased the former Sophisticated Rose clothing store on the southeast corner of the Iola square. The location is to become the new headquarters for Audacious Boutique come mid-January.
Springer laid money down on the two-story building on Aug. 12 without really knowing what he would do with it.
“All I knew was that it needed some TLC,” he said.
And from experience, he knew the building had “good bones.”
The north portion of the building dates back to the early 1870s.
The building to the south is “newer” by a decade or so and was headquarters for the King Bridge Company.
From around 1877 to 1904, both buildings served as one of Allen County’s first courthouses, before the iconic towered brick building was constructed in the courthouse lawn.
When crews removed the wallboard they found a latticework of two by fours behind which stood another wall of plasterboard covering a brick wall.
Today, sections of the plasterboard remain, having been chiseled away in artful forms, leaving bricks exposed elsewhere.
A coat of lacquer brings out their rich tone, said Keith Keller, contractor for the project.
“Polyurethane will sit on top of it. Lacquer sinks into it.”
When the north wall in the adjoining room was tapped, large limestone rocks, not bricks, were revealed.
Poke too deep, and segments crumble into dust.
Keller said he’ll mix Portland cement in with the masonry to fill in the gaps, using lime to give it a whiter tint. “Then some glue will help bond the new and old elements together.”
The lowered ceilings have been removed, exposing a very worn tin-paneled ceiling, many beyond repair.
Thanks to a tip from Joe Works of Humboldt, Springer was able to track down replacements through a Nevada, Mo.-based store W.F. Norman, “the only company in the country that replicates,” the metal panels, Springer said.
