Mid Century Culture

The Royal Barry Wills Cape Home

Posted by: Dave Stuhlsatz • November 2, 2009

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Guest post today from Dave Stuhlsatz, architect with Royal Barry Wills Associates, and my main contact there for all things RBW. I am very pleased that Dave will contribute an occasional article on mid-century architecture, design and related issues. – Pam

The Royal Barry Wills Cape Home
By Dave Stuhlsatz, Royal Barry Wills Associates

The time seems appropriate to revisit Cape Cod House design as it was promoted by a pioneer of their twentieth century revival, Boston architect Royal Barry Wills. When Wills started out in his architecture career he established himself designing English Tudor inspired homes in suburban towns around Boston like Newton and Brookline. But, it was his rigorous examination and subsequent success with the Cape and Colonial Revival homes that cemented his reputation as one of the most influential residential architects in America. Heck yeah there is more →

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Terrazzo tiles in 19 color ways and 3 sizes from Daltile

Posted by: pam kueber • November 1, 2009

daltile-terrazzo-tile-19-colors Daltile snuck these in on me: Authentic terrazzo tiles. Terrazzo is a wonderful authentic retro product for mid-century renovations — and this is the first product of its kind that I have seen. To be sure, buying terrazzo tiles is gonna be a lot easier than trying to find someone to lay a complete (albeit seamless) terrazzo floor. These terrazzo tiles are available in 19 color ways, as either 12″-, 16″-, or 24″-squares. The 24″ squares are almost an inch thick. Heck yeah there is more →

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Wonderful oddities
Three consistently desirable accessories for many owners of mid century homes are pole lamps … room dividers … and display shelves. Well, clever reader Carin recently spotted — and nabbed — this interesting thingamabob that combines all three. It’s a room divider that installs like an adjustable, floor-to-ceiling pole lamp … It features working lights in one of the [...]

What an amazing find. 52 PostnBeam contributes an incredible amount of work on behalf of other Retro Renovators who are searching out vintage steel kitchen cabinets, by posting scores of craigslist leads from around the country on our steel kitchen cabinet Forum every week. In her miraculous searches, she often comes across other amazing finds. [...]

What’s more over-the-top than a wagon wheel light? A wagon wheel light with antlers, of course. However, presuming that wagon wheel lights were one of the original “put a bulb in it” lighting ideas…it’s actually Reasonable to think that the cow-town saloon owners also would add antler bones and the like as decorative, trophy accents. The historical precedent for this mid-century revival is [...]

I am super fascinated by the archaic features and fixtures of midcentury houses…. Things that have been superseded by something more modern, or which simply faded from fashion. Quick! We better get them on the blog fast, so’s we don’t forget them. Stuff like hudee rings, and push-button plumbing, and appliance centers, and today: Dovecotes [...]

I have a confession to make: All these years, I have not really been reading all my vintage marketing materials much — I have been looking at the pictures and kind of scanning text. I have soaked up a lotta, for sure, but now, I have started going back and reading… trying to pick up [...]

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