Borglum Studio Renovation

The City of San Antonio wanted to remodel and start using this historical building for various functions, but had a problem. Both sets of the huge double doors (8′ wide x 12′ high x 3″ thick) on the East and West sides opened into the building and the City’s fire codes require that they open out for fire escape.

We were asked to remove the door frames, doors & trim and re-install them so that they would swing out. Since the stone blocks that make up the exterior wall were 24″ wide we had to custom build a 12” wide door jamb to cover the raw stone on the inside of the building and faux paint it to match.

Gutzon Borglum was a sculptor and designed Mt. Rushmore from this building. Read more about this building and its history in this article at uiw.edu. Also, more details on the renovation can be found in this recent Express-News article.