Some fun stuff in here: Check out the Sexton Genie Bottles, very cool — but line ‘em up, that’s the way to display them! I also spotted a MIB vintage Sears medicine cabinet with lights…vintage Ethan Allen fabric…a Moe Sputnik light (!)…and first up, 7 double rolls of metallic Birge wallpaper. For a foyer perhaps…

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This is a vintage Chambers gas range. I am seriously in love with it, and want it so much that I could burst. For now, though, it is staying in the time capsule house. I am guessing — 60s. Any experts out there who can tell me for sure?

This is the built-in, pop-up griddle. And yes, folks, those are stainless steel (or aluminum?) 4″ tiles behind the stove.

This is the control panel. I am so seriously in love with this stove I cannot stand it.

Here is the vintage Chambers range upstairs. I am dating it 1952 — because that is when the kitchen went in.

Here is the porcelain cover folded down over the burners.

And here is the built-in stove. It’s all so wonderful, and there is still more to come from this house, I’ve barely made a dent.

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Need extra Youngstown kitchen cabinet boomerang pulls? There are 10 on the Forum for $26 inclusive of shipping. Link here.

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Take a neighborhood full of cookie-cutter tract houses …  let their owners fuss with them … and 50 years later photographer Julia Baum finds that they have been “transformed from modest white cubes into a vibrant display of personality and present a rebellion against conformity….human individuality cannot be contained. Inevitably it shines through even the most average facade.” I love her study, which demonstrates again that their is so much to love about our jewel box mid-century homes. No matter how small, the opportunity is there to make them our own.  Read more about Julia’s project and see her slide show of 13 same-yet-different homes here.

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Retro-anthropologist Pam here. I spotted my 70th brand of vintage steel kitchen cabinets: Anemone Kitchen Furnishings, a lower price point brand from English Rose. You can read more about it, and see the complete 1955 ad, over on the Forum.

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More photos from the weekend’s fabulous time capsule house estate sale — today focusing on floors and walls. To start — this typical 50s slate porch or foyer flooring. I adore this type of flooring, and it is still available today at a reasonable cost, because it’s so old-fashioned.

Yowza, here is the downstairs powder room. You know that I love it. It has very 70s wallpaper — on the walls, the closet doors and the ceiling. It’s kind of interesting to see the mod wallpaper and toilet paired with the classic American Standard 50s sink.

Grey Kentile asphalt tiles in an upstairs half bath. I love how the tile is ‘coved’ to work its way up into a baseboard. I am pretty sure this is Kentile because there was an old brochure in the kitchen. I noticed that even though the brochure called this “asphalt tile” it also mentioned “asbestos fillers” — so be cognizant of this issue in your own homes, readers. Get informed, consult with a professional, and decide how you will handle this tile.

More of the fabulous fabulous kitchen floor.

And more.

The upstairs kitchen again, with a better look at how the “two floors” meet. As I took this picture I was standing here:

The upstairs kitchen dining area. Notice the simple pull-shades on the windows, which themselves are classic picture windows flanked by casements.

A downstairs bedroom / reading room. Mod orange wallpaper with wood trimmed in harvest gold paint. The lighting fixture was all swirly orange-and-yellow-and-white. I have to dig further to see if any of my shots really captured it properly, drats.

Lovely wallpaper in an upstairs bedroom. The color — so pleasing. Perfect feng shui color for a bedroom.

Peek a boo. This featured flat panel mirrors in many, many places. I heard that a fancy New York decorator was involved. Yes, to flat panel mirrors! Outside the door on the right is a porch with gorgeous views. There were lots of porches everywhere, too.

Wallpapered ceiling in the big yellow tile bedroom. Fabulous detail. The graphic mix is perfect, too — the angularity of the tiles countered by the simple floral in the wallpaper. I have been reading my feng shui book again, closely. Trick to achieving harmony: Pairing opposites. As evidenced here.

This garden trellis wallpaper was used on the walls and ceiling of the main stairway.

Last but certainly not least – the blue and gray bathroom downstairs. Ha! Many of you are sick of hearing me say “wallpaper your bathroom walls.” Now I add to the litany: “…and the ceiling, too!” This wallpaper is particularly gorgeous – so light and airy but with just enough metallic gravitas to punctuate the gray tile and royal (navy?) blue trim. The tile, by the way, appears to be old…maybe a kind of rubber…that was later painted. Like, this is the original 50s bathroom – they just repainted the tile and added the wallpaper in the 70s. I guess I’d better show the floor, too:

More Kentile – this time, blue. More of those classique American Standard fixtures. And I must say, I love this color combo. It’s one I haven’t seen yet, and it’s quite pleasing.

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With Christmas coming I am on the hunt for mint-in-box items that, under your tree, will set the mood for… 1964. In this bunch — notice the two great bucket purse kits. And when have you ever seen a Bubble-o-Bill Bubble Hat. There also is an Easy Bake Oven. My mom and dad would not let me have one of those. No batteries allowed in our house, it would have bankrupted us. I was so deprived, woe is me.

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I spent not one — but two — days this weekend at a fabulous estate sale in Adams, Mass. I’m really busy with work right now, so don’t have a lot of time to post, but I wanted to start getting photos from the house (and my finds) online. This is a 1952 Geneva kitchen. It was the second, upstairs kitchen in the house. As far as I could tell, it was virtually unused – absolutely pristine.

This is a shot from the dining room, looking through the butler’s pantry toward the downstairs kitchen. You can see Geneva’s also in the butler’s pantry. But the downstairs kitchen was renovated in the 70s, so there were melamine cabinets there…plain white, nothing eye-popping. However, look at this fabulous vinyl-tile floor. Seriously wonderful.

Gold metallic-Asian inspired 70s wallpaper in the (Victorian) dining room. You know I love this paper. Beyond words.

The downstairs master bathroom / dressing room was expansive — a dream bathroom. . Notice the tiled-in nooks just above the vanity top – a very nice feature. That’s a big mirror looking at the closet opposite. The sinks are avocado. The floors are a small multicolored mosaic of white, avocado and harvest gold tiles. This bathroom was incredible.

On the walls were 4×4 harvest gold American Olean tiles, each designed to look like three smaller, longer, rectangular tiles (see image below, as well). Interestingly, I have about 5 big boxes of this very same tile that I picked up at the Re-Store last year. There were Hall-Mack Towelscopes on both ends of the vanity.  Just beyond the door on the right is the separate toilet — that’s a Danish Modern light fixture on the wall, I have some close ups coming. Oh, and to the left of the Towelscope … look up… and you can see the can lights kind of sticking out of the ceiling about an inch… satin chrome or maybe brushed aluminum finish. It was a wonderful detail. Oh yeah – wallpapered ceiling. If you have a house built after, say, 1965, I’d say you must think seriously about wallpapering your ceilings.

Oh — a gorgeous vintage Frigidaire in the upstairs kitchen.

It is going to take me like, five days, to get through all the photos from this house. And then I will start on WHAT I BOUGHT. I was so enthralled, I spent 3 hours at the house on Saturday, then I drove back on Sunday to go through it again. The house was an inspiration.

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Vintage MIB Nutone alert — however, make sure you know what you’re doing before installing this old stuff. There’s also vintage Vera and Lilly Pulitzer, a lovely Syroco alarm clock, some great 70s metallic walllpaper, and the first Moss lamp I’ve shown on the blog.

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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.

Wills made every effort to publicize what he was doing and how to do it. The fact that other architects and designers didn’t seem to grasp some of the subtleties of his techniques only made his services more sought after by those who wanted the genuine article. From its historical roots the Cape style house is a study in simplicity and function, but with the right combination of details and a careful arrangement of proportions it can be a deeply satisfying architectural composition. Wills did not seek to perfectly replicate the rugged and spare shelters of the 17th  and 18th century on Cape Cod. To do so would have certainly alienated a client base that appreciated the imagery of the Colonial era, but with modern conveniences and luxuries like indoor plumbing and garages.

The images below were originally published in the August 26, 1946 issue of Life magazine. They provide a concise summation of the design principles espoused by Wills.

What is ironic about the “Bad Design” is that is the more frequently used model for Cape construction in modern times. Contractors could, and still do, make a compelling argument for the extra space and material economy that can be realized by employing a steeper roof pitch and larger dormers.

The “Good Design” sketch also conceals the time and care that often went into the details of the custom designs produced in the Wills architectural office. The surge of building in the post-war era witnessed a shift to production techniques that favored production speed over individual craftsmanship. The homes that Wills designed early in his career benefited from the input of skilled carpenters who could invest significantly more time in the construction of mouldings and window trim.

These illustrations also conceal the fact that Wills strived to make his architectural commissions a complete expression of his client’s needs and habits. The constant motifs of large chimneys, carefully scaled windows and exquisitely detailed front entrances imply a formulaic approach to the design process. The subtle variations in floorplans, combined with unique site conditions, contradict this assessment. Wills’ houses display a careful balance between space planning and exterior aesthetics.

The Cape house, with living spaces on the ground floor and bedrooms above, was modified successfully by Wills in numerous designs—his book Living on the Level demonstrated how the visual elements of the two story house could be used in single story floorplans. The power of the Cape Cod house derives in no small part from its near limitless flexibility in layout and details, but without discipline, a Cape can turn into a jumble of awkward shapes. By establishing rules for the composition, Wills could steer the design process in a direction that ensured a satisfactory outcome.

And those large central chimneys that define a Wills home—some of them were fake.

Copyright © RetroRenovation.com 2009

Thanks, Dave, and RBW Associates. I look forward to more guest posts.  Reader, in addition to looking at their main site, here’s a page I love with photos from RBW projects over the decades.

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