Retro Renovation

Proof in the pudding that GREAT vintage furniture can be found at GREAT prices if you just bide your time:
Hi Pam,
I just want to thank you for the great post a few weeks back about Kroehler furniture. I set up a search on Ebay in case something good popped up in my area and this [...]

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Amy of I Luv Retro Things sends this fun little chart (below) from one of her Australian design magazines. It focuses on tips for decorating a guest room. I love, how in the postwar period, everyone was very serious about learning their color combination theories and using charts like these to decorate scientifically. Very [...]

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I have a lot of great advertising for 50s bedroom sets, and thought I’d start a new run with this one, a 1952 boxy blonde set from Drexel. It’s so nice to look at 50s furniture other than Heywood-Wakefield, although I’m not knocking it. Point is, there was a lot of really beautiful, well-made furniture [...]

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With so much focus these days on hardwood, tile, cork and here, of course - VCT - flooring, it’s easy to forget that in postwar homes, carpet was very desirable.
In our 1951 colonial-ranch, the long step-down living room had (1975-era) carpet, with plywood underneath. Okay, we tore it out and replaced it with beautiful Berkshires [...]

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click image to enlarge

Goodness, the copywriter sure had fun with this one.
In reality, he (I’m pretty sure) was pointing out that in 1945, lovely bedroom carpets could be made in all your very favorite colors: “…Colors that make you look your loveliest. It stands to reason, if your husband says nice things when you wear [...]

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Now doesn’t this make you want to be 10 again - when no one questions why you would want a bedroom that is sweet sweet sweet?
The wallpaper is Lily of the Valley by Thibaut. I also love it in the yellow. This is so perfectly vintage 40s, 50s — even 60s!

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Okay, I want a humongous plasma TV just like the next person, but frankly, I think I want one of these awesome Predicta models first. These are faithful reproductions — not exact, but faithful — of the original Philco Predictas and there are 8 models — 4 tabletop, 4 on integrated bases. Telstar, the company [...]

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I have two of these braided Capel rugs, and I love them. They are very durable, versatile and affordable — and fit my 1951 colonial ranch home’s decor just fine. Remember, while we may associate modernist ranch houses with the 1940s 50s and 60s, in reality postwar homes were a mix and match…inside and out…of [...]

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Drum roll, please: Announcing 4 new vintage 1950s Atomic wallpapers from Bradbury & Bradbury, launched on RetroRenovation.com today.
Finally, our days of wallpaper deprivation are coming to an end. The images speak for themselves: These papers — along with Atomic Doodle, Googieland and the four 1940s papers that B&B introduced last month — are a tremendous [...]

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After much research, I bought Smith and Noble roller shades for our two bedrooms when we first moved into our 1951 colonial-ranch 6 six years ago. I’ve always been very happy with the choice.
I used the roller shades on all the windows (2 per bedroom) — then, importantly, added a decorative wooden curtain rod fit [...]

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