Retro Renovation » 1957

Merry Mamie Christmas

pam kueber — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 11:00:27 +0000

Merry Christmas, everyone, from Ike and Mamie and me, too, of course. Thanks to Carol Hegeman, Supervisory Historian at the Eisenhower National Historic Site, for providing this wonderful 1957 Christmas card from the Eisenhower collection, featuring Mame and Ike in a Crosley utility vehicle. (Yes – that’s the same Crosley as produced steel kitchen cabinets, refrigerators and the like.) The Eisenhowers’ Christmas cards were designed and produced by Hallmark. Each year the Eisenhowers used a formal card, for obligatory mailings. More interesting (to me), Mamie also had personal cards designed — “fun” cards that she may have put on gifts she was giving, Carol explained. No question: This is a fun one. I wish you all a safe, happy and healthy holiday. Credit: National Park Service, Eisenhower National Historic Site.

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Are you looking for vintage metal kitchen cabinets?

pam kueber — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 09:59:39 +0000

I love this photo posted on our vintage steel kitchen cabinet Forum…and I fussed with it to make it look like an old polaroid. These are 1957 yellow GE cabinets, for sale in St. Louis. How many readers have steel kitchen cabinets — are installing them — or on the hunt?

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A 1957 Time Capsule Kitchen

Erica Donnis — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 08:00:27 +0000

A view of the Koravos family kitchen. Courtesy of Historic New England. Used on this site with permission.

THE 1957 KITCHEN from the Koravos family home in Andover, Massachusetts is the eye candy of the America’s Kitchens exhibition. Imagine original robin’s egg blue metal cabinets, stainless Westinghouse wall oven and cooktop, and canary yellow Formica counters with space-age patterning, all in near pristine condition. Mrs. Koravos preferred to cook in a second full kitchen in her basement, leaving this one on the first floor, which her guests would see, clean and clutter-free. According to curator and co-author Nancy Carlisle, show kitchens were popular in Greek- and Italian-American homes during the twentieth century. And take heart, retro renovators: Historic New England acquired the Koravos gem when a relative of co-author Melinda Nasardinov saw it posted on Craigslist!

Erica Donnis is an independent historian and museum consultant based in Burlington, Vermont. This is her fifth and final vignette reviewing America’s Kitchens — the book and now, a traveling national exhibition. Thank you, Erica!

Readers, click on the image below THREE times and it will get very big so that you can see the detail.

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Youngstown Kitchens Monterey cabinets

pam kueber — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 08:00:26 +0000

Finishing up my Youngstown Kitchens 1957 mini-series, here is their Monterey line. The unique selling proposition of this line: Sandalwood-colored steel base cabinets and doors…. with wall cabinets with Sandalwood-stained wooden doors on steel bases. Reading through this marketing material I see: Industry concern about color fatigue, oh no! “Give us a color we can live with for years” and “that goes with everything,” consumers asked, Youngstown explained. Again…as we’ve discussed before…the move away from enamel-painted steel, which was difficult to repaint (and likely getting more expensive), to wood cabinetry (which was easier to re-paint and also had the “furniture look” of adjoining spaces”, was under way.

At the same time we get a new beige color, we get a bunch of other neat-o features approved by all these folks.

I really like these angled slider cabinets that use the space between the countertops and the wall cabinets. I wonder why they never caught on… perhaps a kitchen can be jammed with *too much* storage… cabinets everywhere? Truth be told: The more storage space you have, the more stuff you accumulate, and stuff can become oppressive.

Here’s more detail on the slider cabinets.

Oven cabinet, dishwasher, garbage disposal. Those Youngstown dishwashers were really something.

Different cabinet combinations possible…

Lovely graphics.

And the complete front page. Love the coppertone brown oven. And dig the black lacquer Early American dining set. We haven’t talked about that. Yet.

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Vintage stoves to love: 1957 Philco Citation range

pam kueber — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 07:59:07 +0000

Vintage stoves were my first true love, so it’s ironic that it’s taken me this long to launch coverage of them. We’re off! Everyone seems to love Bewitched’s Samantha Stephens and her Frigidaire Flair. So I think I’ll start with some quirky pretenders to that famous model. How about this 1957 Philco Citation? Interestingly, in stainless steel, which I don’t see all that much featured in advertising. Note also – laminate cabinets, and stainless steel edging on the countertops just like we still get today at New York Metals!

Below: The refrigerator that went with this lineup in ‘57. Looks like you could cover it with any laminate you like. Hmmm. I think today that this use-a-laminate-panel also should work with a number of dishwashers and a refrigerator like the Sub-Zero. In particular, with so many people wanting to blend their modern-day dishwasher into a retro style kitchen, I think this might be a brilliant question to delve into further. Stay tuned.

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