Vintage pink bathroom tile. We see it all the time. But….this is 4″ x 6″ pink bathroom tile, run vertically. So it qualifies as a wonderful oddity — a woddity. Lookie that nice Hallmack glass shelf with chrome bracket too. A perfectly beautiful shade of Mamie Eisenhower pink.
This story goes under the “Hmmmm, Let’s See What’s in My Photo Files?” file. I took it more than a year ago. It is inside the girl’s bathroom at Monument Mountain High School, down the road from me, in Great Barrington, Mass.
I was at a garden lecture that Margaret gave in connection with the launch of her book. There were other people walking in and out of this bathroom, wondering, surely, who was that nutcase snapping photos. Yes, I am a woddity, too. I think I asked one of them to take a picture of me sitting against the wall. However, I did not like how I looked in that photo, not even with all the retro botox aka pink bathroom tile reflecting deliciously all over me.
I do not know whether you can even get 4″ x 6″ tiles anywhere today. I have a vague recollection of seeing the size listed in a vintage catalog or brochure some time; among my piles somewhere, someday will dig it up. And, I am not sure whether I even *like* this look. It is strange to me. Things look *strange* when you are not accustomed to them. Just as vintage pink bathrooms — even with *plain* 4×4 tiles — may initially repel the uninitiated. The 4×6 tiles railroaded vertically certainly seem to create “height”, compared to what you’d get with a 4×4.
Alas, I bet the girls down at Monument don’t know what a vintage treasure they are experiencing.
I was a student at this school during the mid-1970s. Being a Good Boy, I did not know what the interior of the girls’ room looked like. And being also an Absent-minded Geek, I didn’t take much notice of what the boys’ room looked like either. Save that it was much better after the school set up an official smoking area and the Bad Kids stopped setting fire to the toilet paper.
Having said that, I now own a 1955 house in suburban Virginia. I’m the second owner. I’ll be back with questions :^)
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That is my old high school! It was actually built in the mid-60s (I think the first graduating class was 1967 or 68), so I’m surprised they used a style that was ~10 years old at the time.
It’s been a long time, but I have a vague recollection that the boys’ bathroom was in the same style, except blue.
I can’t help but notice all the vintage tile in old schools, hospitals and churches. I know so many that do not appreciate how beautiful they are.
While STILL waiting to close escrow on my MC-M house with the Mamie pink bathroom and Hall-Mack accessories, I got to thinking the pink bathroom tiles may be 4×6 and came back to look at this post. Then I looked at Margaret’s book and discovered that she used to work with my old roommate Liz. Small world indeed.
Yes, very small world indeed. Good luck with the house!!!