The first step, of course, was to demo and blow out the dividing walls - which, naturally, were also the support walls for the second floor.

The solution was to transfer the load of the second floor to two new support beams placed into the ceiling. The load was then transfered via two, new large posts down to the basement support structures.

It was pretty nerve-wracking when they did the final load transfer, but... They're insured, right?