If anyone was wondering lately what is going on in the second story of the Fox Theater’s “Tea Room” as you drove or walked down Harbor Blvd, well…more restoration work. Fox Board Member and local resident Bob Winkelmann, along with skilled carpenter/volunteer brothers Luis and Ramondo Navarro, have taken on the task of restoring the almost 100-year-old upstairs windows, doors, and corbels.

For the windows, the process involved taking out the windows and painstakingly heat-scraping paint, replacing glass, re-milling rotted mullions, reassembly, and repainting. The rotting corbels on the roof line of the Tea Room have been exactly re-created by Ganahl Lumber’s custom mill shop (in Anaheim) and reinstalled.

“We thought there were things more worth restoring than replacing,” Bob Winkelmann said.

Benefits for Bob and his crew have been discovering the quality of the workmanship that went into the building during its original 1925 construction by Charles and Stanley Chapman, such as the solid teak doors with brass fittings, original paint colors, decorative stencils, etc.

“What I find so exciting is the treasure hunt/archaeology aspect of it—the idea of pulling down boards and not knowing what’s underneath, looking at shadows of what used to be there, and recreating it—bringing it back to what it was before,” Winkelman said.

The project should be completed around December 7.

To learn more about the Fox Theatre Foundation visit www.foxfullerton.org.