Felician College, Iviswold Castle – Rutherford, New Jersey
Felician College, a Gilded Age mansion, presented a classic example of the detachment of plaster from the wood lath as evidenced by numerous broken keys & lugs, and the settlement of plaster away from its substrate.
John Tiedemann Inc. and Historic Plaster Conservation Services (Canada) were asked to assess the ceiling, which featured valuable decorative painting on the surface, and to design an appropriate plaster treatment program to be carried out by John Tiedemann Inc. After easing as much of the ceiling as possible back onto its proper plane using HPCS Micro-Jacks, a variety of HPCS consolidation and adhesive products were applied to treat the ceiling, including GR Non-Shrink Grout to fill spaces between the plaster and wood lath. The “non-shrinking” characteristic of this product ensures that it does not exert any undue stress on the plaster, especially where the ceiling cannot be brought backup into its original alignment.