Retro Renovation

1940s color ideas from a 1939 Kroehler guide

pam kueber — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 10:00:31 +0000

Feast your retro eyes on the 1939 color harmony guide from Kroehler, one of the largest furniture manufacturers back in the day. That smart devil Missouri Michael found it on ebay — it’s still in its original crinkled cellophane wrapper (!) — won it for $2 with no competition, and posted it on his blog. Drats and double drats. It should have been miiiiiiine. My search terms are failing me. Good news, Michael very graciously gave me permission to show the color chart here, too. Remember my recent post on 1940s decorating style? Colors like the ones above are synonymous with the era: Jewel tones with strong Hollywood-glamour contrasts…As well as sweet and sunny kinda-grayed-out pastels. Also: Notice the cheery prints recommended for window treatments. You can read more about Michael’s find — and also access a larger version of this color chart — over on his wonderful blog, Cul-de-sac Shack. Thank you, Michael!

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Wonderful vintage clock & more mid mod madness

pam kueber — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 09:59:41 +0000

Take a look at the clock, designed onto printed linen — it appears to be really quite wonderful, the scale is great — big things are nice. I had to think twice about whether to hoard it for myself. Alas, my house is bursting. Someone nice, please snap it up!

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Animal Rescue – Adopt a Shelter Pet stamps and the Halo meals campaign

pam kueber — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:02:50 +0000

The U.S. Postal Service is introducing these fantastic Animal Rescue – Adopt a Shelter postage stamps on April 30. In addition, Halo pet food — which is co-owned by Ellen Degeneres — has become involved and is donating a million meals to animal shelters. The story behind the adorable photos on the stamps: Photographer Sally Andersen-Bruce found these beautiful, adopted pets in her hometown of New Milford, Connecticut. Each of these animals was given a good home thanks to animal rescue shelters and the families who adopted them. After adopting Astro via Denise and her Schnauzer Paws rescue, I’ve become more and more aware of this issue. Way to go, U.S.P.S., Sally Andersen-Bruce, Denise, Ellen Degeneres, Halo — and to everyone who takes good care of their pets. Good on you, all! Read more about the Animal Rescue Adopt a Shelter Pet stamps and campaign here… and plan on stocking up on these stamps come April 30 (I’ll do a reminder then, too.)

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Russel Wright clock & lots more mint-in-box madness

pam kueber — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:00:46 +0000

There is so much great vintage stuff showing up in my ebay searches every day that I think I will have slide show widgets every day this week. Remember (Disclosure): Anything that you buy — from these ebay carousels or otherwise – when you click into ebay via any link on my site nets me a teensy commission.

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What colors should Jamie use for her turquoise, burgundy and pink bathroom?

pam kueber — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 10:00:09 +0000

Jamie is in the final stage of renovating her 1950 bathroom, which has an *unusual* combination of tile, trim and fixtures: Turquoise tile, burgundy trim, and pink sink, tub and toilet. You can see an unmasked photo of the colors on the jump, but I had to use this one for the lead because: Oh my goodness, haven’t we all been here, amidst CHAOS. Now that the walls are prepped and the vanity and window are stripped of their old layers of paint (I hope you tested for lead and used proper safety/enviro precautions, Jamie), Jamie wants some “okay-now-I-must-really-make-a-final-decision-so-let-me-torture-myself-some-more” advice on what to do with the walls and the vanity to tie everything together. Okay, I am only assume she’s torturing herself — because that’s what I do, no question. Jamie has asked our help. Read on for her complete explanation… see some more photos (great curved ceilings!) and then let’s hear what you have to say, retro renovators. Jamie writes:

The bathroom "before" the wood vanity and window were stripped of old paint, and "before" the walls were prepped. AWESOME gorgeous basics, wouldn't you agree? That turquoise is LUMINOUS.

I was hoping you and the other readers could possibly give me some ideas for my bathroom. I have included a before-picture and a picture of how it looks now. The window frame and cabinets have already been stripped of all paint. When prepping the walls we came to the conclusion that the original paint was a pink that was an almost exact match to the sink, tub, and toilet. We were thinking that the cabinets may have originally been pink too….seems like a lot of PINK! Toying with the idea of staining the window and cabinets, but…not sure. I honestly would just love a fresh opinion…I have poured over the site and books but I am just not having any luck on ideas… I think the problem for me is trying to figure out all the different colors….pink , turquoise, and burgundy. I look at other bathrooms and haven’t quite found the same color combination…

Thanks so much! Jamie

So, readers, what do you think? What should Jamie do with the walls… and the vanity and window frame… to tie everything together in one sparkly jewel box bathroom package? I am going to hold back and let you readers run today’s show. A few more photos are below — delicious!

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A Way to Garden

pam kueber — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:00:09 +0000

Margaret Roach of A Way To Garden

It was 60 degrees in the Berkshires yesterday. Spring spring spring is in the air, and you can smell the mud. I’ve already start making plans to get my hands seriously dirty in the garden, especially out back where I will be entering Year 9 of Landscaping The Forest. These days, I have the best inspiration yet in Margaret Roach and A Way To Garden. Margaret is a kindred sister blog-a-lot, and she and I alternated as pep talker and pep talkee as we both muddled through our dark cold days of winter blog refreshes — blog refreshes are what you do when you can’t garden. Her updates turned out great — and oh my, her site is a treasure trove. Go over and dig in — there are tips for pruning, mulching, growing tomatoes, making pickles, great shrubs, great perennials and more more more. She also has an acerbic weekly cartoon, lots of critter tales, a demon cat who would trounce my retro wonder dog, and oh — a drop-dead mouthwatering gorgeous garden, of course. Go, Margaret!

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Yellow Geneva metal kitchen cabinets

pam kueber — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 09:59:06 +0000

Scathing Jane spotted this big, pretty set of yellow Geneva steel kitchen cabinets for sale in Pittsburgh on craigslist. $500. Isn’t yellow a delightful color for kitchen cabinets? Thanks, Jane, and 52PostnBeam, too, for all the volunteer work you do posting kitchen cabinets and vintage plumbing items onto the Retro Renovation Forum.

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Linoleum floors and countertops brighten up Dave & Frances’ 1938 kitchen

pam kueber — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:00:25 +0000

Dave and Frances bought a wonderful single-owner 1938 home last year, and have just finished up some modest yet gorgeous updates to their kitchen. The most dramatic improvement: Marmoleum linoleum for both the floor and countertop, edged in stainless steel. Dave writes:

Hi Pam,

Just thought I’d drop you a note. Thanks to inspiration from your site, we just recently, i.e. in the last 24 hours, finished rejuvenating the kitchen in our 1938 house. It didn’t take much, the cabinets were in great shape and the 1958 GE range looks brand new (we’re only the second owners of the house), but the very neutral vinyl floors and formica had to go. We replaced the floor with a medium blue Marmoleum with a dark blue stripe and did the countertops with the same dark blue Marmoleum and the same stainless steel edging you did your countertops with. We finished off with a new Kohler sink with hudee ring.

Dave continues:

We’ve been in the house for right about a year. We outgrew our 900 sq ft 1931 brick house by the time our twin boys turned one and casually started trolling the real estate sites. We knew we wanted another brick house and were fond of the late 20’s through early 40’s architectures. We found this one at about 10 p.m. one night and I promptly drove over that night to check out the neighborhood. This house was about 2 miles west, right in the neighborhood we were most hoping to find something…. We put in a contingent offer and our old house sold the same day it was listed! This house is about 1,700 sq. ft. excluding the unfinished basement.

We bought it from a lady whose dad originally built the house and she had been living in it since she was 12. I even found a copy of the building permit in the basement dated 1939 with her dad’s name on it. We love it when old houses look old and have their original elements so needless to say we instantly fell in love with this house. My wife took a slight bit of convincing since the exterior architecture has a bit less whimsical character than our old house. Being late 30’s, it seemed to be gaining some of the minimalist traditional lines as opposed to the revival era cottage/tudor look of our early 30’s old house. The house was in impeccable shape. Prior to us moving in, the original owner had just removed red shag carpet covering the red oak hardwoods and douglas fir softwoods (upstairs).

I believe the only real non-original elements were kitchen floors and countertops and the light fixtures save for a fantastic deco chandelier in the dining room. We’ve gone through and replaced the non-original light fixtures with a combination of vintage and reproduction. We also replaced the switch plates and outlet plates with NOS brown bakelite plates, but many of the original brown bakelite tumbler switches are still installed and working. We haven’t taken many pictures of the inside of the house since we moved in, but I posted the staged real estate pics from last year if you would like to see them.

You can tell that the stove desperately needs a big white and chrome Big Chill fridge next to it, I’m still trying to convince my wife of that though… (Even so,) you’ll see my wife decided to get in on the whole retro thing with an attempt to recreate one of the campy vintage ads

If you’re interested, here are the particulars for the rejuve:

Marmoleum field color: “Sparkling Lake”, this seemed almost identical to the color in the Armstrong ad

Marmoleum stripe and countertop color: “Deep Ocean”, this too seemed nearly identical

James at Nielsen Bros. Flooring (Seattle) did the install work (James was very patient when it came time to do the metal trim)

Light over the Fridge: Rejuvenation “Atlantic” fixture with “Streamline 8 inch Opal” shade

Light over the Dinette: Rejuvenation “Arcadia” fixture with ”Streamline 8 inch Opal” shade

Kohler Triton Facet (K-7776) and Kohler Triton Cross Handles (K-16012-3)

Kohler Bakersfield White Sink (K-5834) — I found out the hudee ring is sold separately.. (K-6599)

Stainless steel edging from New York Metals — One nice hint, too. Wherever I ended up with cracks in the mitered corners and whatnot, I used silver/gray gutter sealant as a filler. It blends in fairly nicely with the stainless. Soldering would probably be best, but this was far easier.

We got inspiration for the color palette from a 1941 armstrong ad I found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanvintagehome/3331401646/

I asked Dave in our email exchange whether he had considered Bradbury and Bradbury’s 1940s wallpaper line. He responded:

It’s funny you mention the wallpaper. I was just showing my wife some of the deco wallpaper on their site last night. You can’t see it in any of the photos, but as you leave the kitchen toward the hallway and head out the back door, there is a wall about 6 feet long covered with some wallpaper from the 70’s. Some of their wallpaper there would be perfect.

Fantastic work, Dave and Frances — the linoleum with the contrasting trim is fantastic, the countertop looks great, and you know I love that Kohler sink. Clearly, you show how making just some minor updates made to fundamentally sound original features can make for a charming (and not too expensive) renovation that makes the house truly feel like your own. I do have two questions I forgot to ask: I was under the impression that today’s linoleum in not particularly recommended for countertops. What were you told about this issue? Also, did you have to adjust the size of the countertop substrate material in order to accommodate the increased thickness of the linoleum vs. laminate? Thank you so much for sharing — this story will be very popular with readers whose homes or styles tend more toward 1940s sweetness than 1950s atomic.

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Jill’s 1962 Beatles bathroom

pam kueber — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:00:30 +0000

Jill writes:

I thought I wanted to renovate my 1962 guest bathroom, but really didn’t want to spend that kind of money. I decided to embrace my pink bathroom after seeing your website, and it sure saved me a lot of money! We used a mix of period decor and more modern “salute to the 60’s” decor such as the record album covers. It was fun.

My husband found out what I was doing, and insisted that I include a shot that showed the early Beatles memorabilia. Since it’s his birthday and I’ve been making fun of him all day for being even older than the bathroom, I thought I’d include that one too, just to be nice.

Wonderful bathroom, Jill — fantastic that you found the inspiration to save it, and save oodles of money, too. My favorite quote of the week already: “My husband found out what I was doing [sending pics to this blog], and insisted that I include a shot that showed the early Beatles memorabilia.” haha. Many thanks for sharing.

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Vintage Lightolier, Witco, Raymor & more

pam kueber — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 09:59:07 +0000

I continue to find lots and lots of great MIB NOS and otherwise yummy stuff out there. Disclosure: I belong to the ebay partner network and receive a small commission on any item you buy whenever you click into ebay from a link on this site.

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