General Contractor in Gardner, MA

Gardner has a housing personality all its own. Known for over a century as "The Chair City" and "The Furniture Capital of New England," the town built up around its factories - which means the residential building stock is a mix of late-Victorian worker housing near the old industrial center, mid-century single-families fanning out from West Gardner Square, and post-1980 subdivisions along the edges.

A lot of the homes we work on in Gardner were built between 1890 and 1940 for mill and factory workers. These are typically modest two-story wood-frame houses with full basements, original double-hung windows, and balloon framing - meaning the wall studs run continuously from foundation to roofline, with no fire blocking. That's important to know before you open up walls. The factory-town heritage also means the lots are often small and tightly packed, which constrains addition work in ways that don't apply in surrounding rural towns.

Gardner runs as a city rather than a town, so the building department on Pleasant Street handles permits and the inspection schedule is consistent year-round. The conservation commission gets involved on projects near Crystal Lake, Dunn State Park, or the Otter River, which we coordinate as part of the project scope.

We're about 40 minutes from Gardner from our shop in South Barre, and we've worked steadily in the city for decades - kitchen remodels in the older homes off Parker Street, additions in the West Gardner neighborhoods, full custom builds in the newer subdivisions on the Westminster line.