Corrales’ venerable Casa Vieja, long a premier restaurant in the metro area, is now structurally sound and awaiting a new roof, according to its owner, attorney Floyd Wilson.

“I’m getting bids on putting on a new roof,” he added. “Whatever issues remain sort of relate to the roof.

“We’re also waiting for the Village of Corrales to get the sewer line ready for us to hook up. That would be very helpful.” 

Wilson said the building could function as a restaurant without the sewer service, “but it would be so much better to have the sewer in place.”

Designation of Casa Vieja as a cultural property by the N.M. Historic Preservation Division in late 2011 was expected to hasten Casa Vieja’s restoration.

  At that time, Wilson said, “Basically we need tax credits to move ahead with restoration. But we intend to get it back going again. I would expect restoration will begin  in 2012.”

Casa Vieja, perhaps 300 years old by some estimates,was ordered closed by Corrales’ building inspector last summer after water damage jeopardized the safety of its adobe or terrón walls. (See Corrales Comment Vol.XXX, No.13, August 20, 2011 “Can Sewer Line Completion Save Water-Weakened Casa Vieja?”)

Wilson said he needed to have the cultural resource designation in place before he applied for tax credits and loans to make repairs that would include a new roof.

An architect was hired last summer to design changes to the old structure that would keep its historic character intact.

Building inspector Chris Sisneros  ordered Casa Vieja closed August 5, 2011 after an earthen wall in the dish washing area of the restaurant began to crack open.

Sisneros’ August 5, 2011 letter to Wilson said: “Since the above items [listed by Sisneros as problems at Casa Vieja] are structural in nature and can affect the life-safety of the occupants of the building, it was required to shut down the building.”

When the owners of the restaurant business (as distinct from the owner of the property), Josh and Kate Gerwin,  took down the Casa Vieja signs at the entrance along Corrales Road over the August 6-7 weekend, rumors flew all over the village, some saying the entire building would be demolished.

The Casa Vieja dish room was a pretty wet place, as in most restaurants. The Gerwins could tell the wall there was having problems, so they called in Bonifacio Gurule, the adobe expert who the previous year had shored up the blue viga portal that fronts Corrales Road.

When Gurule removed more plaster to look at the wall beneath, he was stunned to see it was wet some three feet up from the floor. When he examined the wall in the northeast dining room, near the building’s septic tanks, he found it too was wet.

At that point, he called the Village building inspector to come have a look. 

Sisneros’ August 2011 letter to Wilson reported his findings as follows.

“1. An area in the kitchen was shored up due to the fact there was structural failure in the existing building system. That system includes a load-bearing wall which was opened up due to heavy moisture that was identified in the existing adobe structure.

“2. An area in the northeast dining room was identified as having structural integrity issues on the northern wall. Plaster was falling from the existing wall. Excessive moisture was identified in lower parts of the wall.”

Concerns over the roof seemed to be far less severe; basically the vigas in the ceiling are sagging — not much of a surprise for an old adobe building. Sisneros described his findings, “The bar area has structural failure to the existing vigas which were identified to be deflecting at six inches in the center of the span. That existing roof appears to have an original earthen finish roof; there was evidence of this existing earthen roof pouring into the bar area as a fine powder.”

Sisneros closed his letter by stating, “In order for the building to be occupied, a structural engineer must provide a report as to the conditions of all the building’s structural systems.”

Clearly the old building can be saved.  but what that would cost is still undisclosed, although an early estimate put it at around $300,000.

Gurule, owner of the construction firm Corrales Builders, is convinced Casa Vieja can be salvaged. “The walls will have to dry out and then be stabilized,” he suggested last year.  “For sure, the best  case scenario is to save the building. I love these old buildings.”

The basic problem is that most, if not all, of the floors in Casa Vieja are below-grade; the floors are lower than the surrounding ground. Although that’s probably been true for much of the old building’s 300-plus years, that may not have been a serious problem earlier.

Suspicions were that waste water drainage from the dish-washing room may have saturated the ground below and outside that northern wall, perhaps from broken pipes and maybe exacerbated by an over-burdened leach field.

Others said the air conditioning unit may have contributed to the water problem.

Despite the many additions and renovations Casa Vieja has undergone over the years, its style, charm and essence have kept the old building dear to the hearts of Corraleños.

It is among the most public of Corrales’ old buildings, having functioned as a restaurant more or less continuously for at least the past 40 years.  

But it was known locally as “Casa Vieja” long before it was one of the better known restaurants in the greater Albuquerque area. It had served as the Martinez family ancestral home before it was purchased by the Harrington family in 1943. (See Corrales Comment Vol XXIX, No.19, November 20, 2010 “Casa Vieja Yields Rewards, Tax Revenues for Village Services;” see also “Mayor Searches for Way Forward on Stalled Sewer Project”)

The Gerwins had continued restoring and updating of the building since they acquired the restaurant in late 2008. They thoroughly gutted the kitchen area to rebuild it as they wanted. They stripped down the old floors in the main dining room, installed modern plumbing fixtures and generally brightened the interior. But the roof is still made of dirt packed on ceiling planks over most of the original strong vigas supported by 30-inch thick earthen walls. 

Last summer, Casa Vieja’s trademark front portal was saved when the Gerwins noticed is was sagging drastically… much lower than it had been just days before. “You could tell it was going to fall,” Kate Gerwin said.

They convinced Gurule to repair and stabilize it for about the same cost it would have been to tear it down and haul it away.

When finished, the sagging portal had been lifted 26 inches to its original height.