Gabriel and Amanda own a stunning house, designed by architect John Erwin Ramsay, in North Carolina. “Own” may not be the right word, though: To me, Gabe and Amanda clearly have taken on the role as “caretakers” of this house with so many original features. Above: Holey Jetsons, one of my newest favoritest kitchens ever. Continue on for the story and 27 more photos of this beautiful home.

Gabe writes:

We spent about year looking for the perfect house, and in 2007 while working out of town Amanda did an internet search for a nearby county.  As soon as she saw it she called Gabe and told me she’d found our house!

We weren’t looking for midcentury, but it was looking for us.  It screamed “Nicholson”.  During our first visit we were surprised to find the door was unlocked.

We stayed for hours planning out exactly what we would do once we owned it.  We had to have it!

Luckily we didn’t have the money to do all the renovations we wanted right away, because we ended up falling in love with many of the original aspects that we had considered changing.

During the five years we have lived in our very original, mid- mod we have fallen in love with this house over and over.

We can’t imagine living anywhere else.

With the help of George Smart of (trianglemodernisthouses.com) we located our architect and discovered our house plans were stored in the N.C. State University School of Design Archives.

Since this discovery we have worked to locate and document other works by the same architect, John Erwin Ramsay AIA, of Salisbury, N.C.

We started immediately collecting pieces from the 50’s 60’s and 70’s. This passion for authentic pieces has continued to grow.  We eventually sold all our furniture and accessories to be replaced with vintage pieces.

Yes, everything has to be vintage… even the can opener, umbrellas, and pot holders. We love going out as close to period as we can on everything! and even have a closet full of vintage clothes, purses, jewelry, hats, ties, etc.. p.s. even a pink ’62 Caddy and ’60 Ford truck.

(The 1962 Caddy is Amanda’s, and it is a mostly original survivor car.

And it is the original factory color, ”Laurel”. Elvis would just call it pink!

The 1960 truck is ruff but it has such character! I have enjoyed it so much more than anything new!…Rust Rules!

(BTW the dogs are “Ellie” (white) and “Lucy” (black).)

We were always drawn to old, simpler times as well as simple clever design… I’m an artist and a musician so I’ve always been enamored with interesting lines, colors and the practical / impractical Design for the sake of Art and usability.Some specifics about the house..   it was built in 1954, it is 4 bedrooms, 2 ½ bath, 3000 sq feet and sits on 5 acres.  We purchased it from the original owner and had the privilege of his sons visiting us a few years ago.

We learned so much about the house from this visit, including that the terrazzo flooring was laid by 2 men they flew in from from Italy …..

How do you even begin to do that without the internet?????

Check out my house sign I made and custom mail box stand my dad helped me make out of steel tubing!

The mailbox is period, I just took it apart, restored it and painted it to match the house.

The stickers on the bathroom tile are original and feature teams from the 50′s and their old logo’s some aren’t even around anymore like the Washington senators!

The boys who stuck these on as kids ended up visiting us and checking out what we’ve been doing. (They posed for photo during their visit, above, from left: Barry and Mark Levin.) They remember sticking them there.

Some other great features: Check out the Thermador double ovens and warmers.. Original CRAZY wallpaper overhead in the background!!!!

… the Herman Miller desk and drawers set..

Big umbrellas by the pool.. (pool unrestored but a whopping 25′ x 40′.

We love living with and using our mid century pieces every day.  It has become so normal to us living this way that it is sometimes funny when someone starts commenting on one of our period staples like the double Thermador ovens or the vintage toaster. It makes you stop and think about the fact that some of that stuff and this house is approaching 60 years old! Boy they don’t make ‘em like this anymore.

Portaits of Gabe and Amanda: By Kyle Pierce Photography

Wow. Gabe and Amanda, it is clear that you are Livin’ the Dream. Thank you so much for sharing! xoxo

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1. Early American all across the U.S.A. — Today, when the mass of shelter media talk about “mid-century” they usually focus on the “modern.” But I believe that in the immediate post World War II-era and well beyond, Early American interiors were far more common. I’ve talked a lot on this site about the influence of Royal Barry Wills and his Cape Cod homes. This style of home was massively popular for many years following the war. True ranch-style homes in the Cliff May style took much longer to take hold and even then, merchant builders all across the country designed ranches with Cape Cod and Colonial design touches. And inside, we often saw: Ranch-style floor plans with Early American interiors. Key elements of an Early American interior could include: Paneling, brick fireplaces with colonial-style molding, maple furniture, Americana wallpaper, plaids and traditional prints, and heirloom pieces from… Colonial days! Here are three more of my favorite stories about Early American design and decor:

• My Mid Century Modest Manifesto
• Mid Century Modest and the blog profiled in an Etsy.com video
• The Royal Barry Wills Cape Home

2. Do It Yourself with Knotty Pine and Resilient Floor Tile — In the same vein as the massive trend to Early American interior design, we saw millions of kitchens with knotty pine kitchens and basements, attics, sunrooms and even main living areas paneled with knotty pine. However, I think this particular design cue was not just about the colonial, but as much or more about the: Do It Yourself. In the aftermath of World War II, Americans did have money to buy homes, but from what I’ve read, they were very conservative about parting with their hard-earned cash. They had the famous Depression mentality. They also had woodworking skills and tools. These factors led them to do a lot of the interior finishing work of their homes themselves. For example: Quite famously, 1.5 story Cape Cod homes — like those at the original Levittown — often were sold with the top story unfinished. Homeowners knew they could finish that space later, as their families grew. Knotty pine fit with the Early American aesthetic of the time, and was relatively easy and cheap to install upstairs. Here are a few of my favorite stories on knotty pine:

• Everyone loves Eartha Kitsch’s knotty pine kitchen..
• And Traci’s, with adjacent, knotty pine dining room…
• And Betty Crafter’s, with its aquamarine appliances and countertop…

3. Heywood-Wakefield and Kroehler Streamline Moderne — At the same time Early American decor was popular, we also saw strong consumer interest in what I will call “Heywood-Wakefield and Kroehler Streamline Moderne” style interiors. These particular pieces, with their bulky, rounded edges, are carryovers from the pre-war Streamline era. The way I remember what “streamline” is, is to recall it’s like a Streamliner train — meant to look like it’s moving, even when it’s standing still. In a way, this is not really 1950s style — it’s 1940s style. But, when World War II was on, manufacturing of discretionary items like furniture ground to an almost complete halt. In the immediate aftermath of the war, manufacturers just pulled out their designs from before the war and started producing them to meet immediate demand. It took a while for new design looks to be introduced. Here are some favorite stories about the streamline look that was still popular from around 1946-1953:

• 1948 Streamline Moderne time capsule house. (Okay, it’s 1948, but you gotta see it!)
• Heywood Wakefield furniture — still made, in the USA, today
• Readers upload photos of their sofas. (Okay, mish mash – but it sure does show the diversity!)

4. Pretty in Pastels — The author Thomas Hine dubbed the years 1953-1963 the Populuxe years in a book of the same name. It was an exuberant time — and that led to exuberant colors inside the home, and out. If you have read this blog for more than a week, you know that I love to talk about pink bathrooms. Not necessarily because they are my favorite — I love all the midcentury pastel bathrooms — but because they are “emblematic” of the period. That is: In one little room, they capture the optimism of the 1950s — and they have a story that even includes Mamie Eisenhower. At the same time, though, the pink is not well understood among the mass of homeowners today — which puts these sweetheart bathrooms at risk. Emblematic = Learn about the pink bathroom and you can begin to understand an entire era. More pastel loveliness:

• Where to get vintage colored tile (and more) — all my resources.
• Scenes from 22 blue midcentury bathrooms
• And, my microsite Save The Pink Bathrooms, of course.

5. Full-on Midcentury Modern — The 1950s were glory days for proponents of full-on mid century modern design. To me, the key determinant of what’s MCM is that it lacks unnecessary ornamentation — focusing first and foremost on the function. “Form follows function.” Also important: Using newly available technology to develop new solutions… And then, there is a whole artistic side to things, such as referencing nature and organic shapes. Above: From Armstrong Floors. More:

• 28 places to buy a mid century modern style sofa
• Video tour of the Miller House in Columbus, Indiana
• Steven’s 1957 Alcoa Aluminum ‘Care-free’ demonstration house

6. Better Living through Technology – The invention and mass merchandising of plastic countertops — like Formica — was a big breakthrough for American homemakers. Plastic surfaces were much easier to install and clean, and this was a big deal in a nation where things like automatic washing machines and dryers were will still not accessible to the masses. Ask any woman from back in the day about “washing day” and watch her cringe — it was arduous, to say the least. Things that could make keeping house easier were a BIG DEAL. Gas and electric stoves… refrigerators… dishwashers… air conditioning… vacuum cleaners… even INDOOR PLUMBING… made their way into the majority of American homes only after World War II. Into this “Technology” bucket, I also will included products, through their styling, that reflected the Atomic Age. We saw lights that looked like flying saucers… cabinet pulls and doorsets that looked like starbursts…. and those boomerangs on the Formica are organic shapes.

• Video tour of The Wilson House – a shrine to laminate
• 30 wonderful oddities — “woddities” — from midcentury America (list as of Sept. 2011 – keeps growing)

7. William Pahlmann Eclectic — Of course, no one is forced to follow any single design trend religiously. My favorite new interior designer from the postwar era is William Pahlmann, who is recognized for introducing “eclectic” into the world of interior design. For example, he would put European antiques and ancient South American pottery into a room with a long, low modern sofa… he would mix things up. The room above is not his (as far as I know), it is from a 1950s paint advertisement. It’s always been one of my favorites. And interestingly for this story, it includes a bit of most every trend (although no Streamline) that I’ve talked about. Early American: In the painting and paneling. Resilient floor: In the kitchen. Pastels: On the kitchen cabinets and far wall. Full-on Midcentury Modern: In the furnishings. (Although that lovely dining room table adds Shaker-esque cues to the MCM. Me like.) Atomic: In the light fixture. There’s even a European porcelain coffee pot. A timeless room.

• William Pahlmann time capsule house — 15 interior design lessons (okay, 1962, but I think he’s timeless)
• Some of the interiors designed by Hazel Dell Brown and her Armstrong Floors team in the 1950s are stunning — like this 1954 beach cottage …
• … and this 1954 living room.

My “Bible” of fabulous 1950s images (affiliate link):

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One of the cool things about this catalog is that it gives us cute model names for each of the sink designs. Above: The Kitchen Queen.

There also are some illustrated kitchen design renderings to ogle. Remember, in 1953, America was transitioning from a “1940′s” look to a “1950s” look. These kitchens are more ’40s looking – typified by white cabinets, true linoleum floors, deeper (rather than pastel) colors, and deco and streamline touches — which you can clearly see in the kitchen above. The color on the wall, by the way, is a ringer, I’d say, for the Caribbean Coral in Sherwin-Williams’ Suburban Modern Palette.

Relive 1953 kitchens –> To use the slide show, click on the first thumbnail… it will enlarge… move forward or back via the arrows below the image… you can start or stop at any image…

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