Downtown Olympia, Tumwater's historic district, and the South Capitol neighborhood are renowned for historic architectural treasures: Victorian Queen Annes, Craftsman bungalows, and early-century cottages built between 1880 and 1930.
Nearly all homes from this era were constructed using 'pier-and-beam' (post-and-pier) foundations. Instead of a continuous poured concrete perimeter wall, the house was built on a wooden perimeter skirt with the structural floor load supported by interior wooden posts resting on fieldstones, stacked red clay bricks, or old-growth Western red cedar blocks buried directly in the dirt.
Over a century of exposure to damp Western Washington groundwater takes an inevitable toll. Cedar posts eventually rot, unreinforced lime-mortar brick piers crumble into sand, and fieldstones sink unevenly into soft clay, causing historic floors to bow, plaster walls to crack, and rooflines to sag visibly.
Restoring a historic post-and-pier home requires specialized sensitivity to historic preservation combined with modern structural engineering. Simply cranking on a hydraulic jack can crack original lath-and-plaster ceilings and snap historic Douglas fir framing.
Olympia Foundation Repair Pros executes systematic, multi-point synchronized hydraulic leveling. We excavate beneath compromised pier locations, pour steel-reinforced concrete spread footings below the frost line, install seismic tie-down hardware, and replace decayed timbers with treated lumber and adjustable galvanized steel jacks, stabilizing historic structures for another century.