CONSTRUCTIVE ARTS LLC

He provided a very detailed written contract, and is very detailed himself. He kept me well informed, did the work according to the agreed contract. He was very professional. There was a short delay in the work, but he did secure the backyard because of this. ADDENDUM: The gate was made like a shaker cabinet door. The panels are not nailed in but sit in the groove. They were not sealed. He stated that this was so they could expand with the weather and he also stated he drilled holes for draining the water. He also put four coats of paint on the Cyprus wood for weather protection. After a year and a half I noticed that the panels were cracked and the paint was bubbling up indicating that it was not properly protected from the rain and various weather conditions. I spoke with him and he indicated that the weather damage was more severe than he expected. He told me he could repair it at an hourly wage having it take two days and that he could not have guaranteed his previous work. He instructed me to secure the gate with a tarp which I did. He indicated that it did not need to be caulked as another provider suggested. The problem was that there is too much rain in this area and that I needed a structure to be built on top to keep the rain off. I called a couple of other people to get some additional opinions. I explained the construction and read some contract details. They wanted to know what was done to treat the ends of the wood that were not exposed. They also stated that the gate should have been caulked and the unexposed areas epoxied as well. The outside was epoxied but the ends of the unexposed panels were not. Since there was no caulking done, this should have been taken care of as a precaution. It has been hard for me to find someone to come out to look at the gate and offer an idea as to how it can be fixed. I later ran into the man from Constructive Arts and he started explaining how he could build a decorative cover for it. I just did not want to do that. I talked to him about the unexposed areas not being epoxied or the structure caulked and he told me he was trying to cut costs for me. At no time was this ever discussed. I do not trust his solutions and I do not want to pay him again to fix a problem with his original design.

He has excellent craftsmanship. He was punctual, polite, and the job was done by the hour. It took more hours than he initially estimated, but it was a difficult job and he did it well.