Time warp homes! Meet the women who've turned their homes into authentic shrines to favorite decades

[Surya Gayatri]

Last edited Tue Apr 7, 2015, 11:10 AM - Edit history (1)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3027968/The-women-ve-turned-homes-shrines-favourite-decade.html


Meet the women who have shunned modern living and designed their homes around their favourite decade. Claire Nugent (top and bottom left and bottom right) and her husband Nigel Morter restored a 1940s airfield control tower in Norfolk and now run it as a B&B. She says the bathrooms were the biggest source of stress - and admits to spending £400 on a 1940s loo.

Emma Edwards (centre) runs vintage website missbamboo.co.uk and says she fell in love with the flamboyance of the 1950s - saying 'they were so kitsch and glamorous'. At one stage Emma had six 1950s cocktail bars in her home.

Ursula Forbush (top and bottom right), who loves everything kitsch, says from the red glass vases and psychedelic wallpaper, to the Formica tables and G-plan dining suite, everything her two-bedroom terrace home is a tribute to the late Sixties.
_____________________
Some people have too much cash and time on their hands.

But, whatever floats your 'boast', I guess. (Intentional pun there, peps. Started as typo, but then I liked it.

[MADem]

1. I can't get the link to work. I get a File Not Found.

The 1940s pic doesn't look too accurate to me--that glass topped table and the giant indoor plant seem more modern, though the kitchen looks good from what little I can see in the tiny pic.

[pinboy3niner]

4. Try this link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3027968/The-women-ve-turned-homes-shrines-favourite-decade.html

[Surya Gayatri]

8. Fixed... thanks, MADem!

[MADem]

13. Great article--enjoyed the pics! nt

[Surya Gayatri]

14. Good, I don't usually sink to the DM, but sometimes they

do stuff that nobody else does!

[MADem]

42. I don't trust them for political analysis, but for Smoking Gun/TMZ gossip, and

picture - heavy clickbait articles on pop culture, hey, why not? They're probably as accurate as ... Rolling Stone, anyway!!!

[Surya Gayatri]

45. Oh, snap!

[KittyWampus]

2. So people should just be happy living in milk crates?

And a lot of vintage furniture found in thrift shops for $50 is better quality than the paste board crap made today.

I like people have style and take time to fix up their place.

[Surya Gayatri]

5. Like I said, to each his own. Depends how obsessional the

'hobby' becomes, I guess.

Moderation in all things--first precept of the Middle Way.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Way

[Marengo]

16. And if the time and money spent on a hobby exceeds your perimeters of acceptance...

Then what?

[Surya Gayatri]

17. Well, we'll send in the 'hobby' police, that's what!

[Ratty]

36. That's supposed to be

Moderation in all things, especially moderation. If we can't go crazy every once in awhile then life isn't worth living.

[Surya Gayatri]

37. Again, to each his own. For those who have chosen

the Middle Way, moderation is a spiritual practice.

[Adrahil]

9. You can get good furniture today...

But it costs an arm and a leg. Most of our house now has older, solid wood furniture we got at antiques malls for LESS than what the equivalent would cost today, and about the same priss ass the particle board with veneer stuff.

[merrily]

3. Thanks to ebay, I have Depression era glass dinnerware.

Not the really fancy stuff, though. The kind a working family might have bought.

I acquired it bit by bit because I thought it was so pretty, not because I wanted to think of the Depression while I eat lunch or have coffee with my pals. But, I do admire the artists and glass makers who produced that stuff. The "Depression glass" industry kept a lot of people working during the Depression and I do admire that as well. I also admire the people who were so careful with their things that glass dinner still available, intact, for me to buy almost a century later.

[Surya Gayatri]

6. They don't make them like that anymore...

IKEA reigns supreme.

[merrily]

7. They don't make people like that anymore, either.

I remember a stand up comic talking about prior generations, though I don't remember his name. The punchline was something like, "I need a nap I go to the cleaners and the post office in the same day."

[ieoeja]

41. You might find one at a Renaissance Festival.

One year I finally broke down and bought a glass from the glass blowers at Bristol, WI Faire. Thing was great. So I decided to buy a bunch next year. Naturally, after years of the same glass blowers, they decided that year to replace them. And the new guy is more about art than function.

Mind you, he has stuff in the Smithsonian. It is really nice. But I just want a durable glass into which I can fit my hand for cleaning.

[liberal N proud]

10. My wife says she would like an old house

And I say only if we can modernize it with regards to plumbing, electrical, hvac and other things that are necessary for a comfortable existence today.

[Surya Gayatri]

11. There's just some stuff ya can't do without nowadays.

[JustAnotherGen]

12. We bought a 100 year old home

With the 1960's wall paper on the ceiling in the kitchen. Yikes!

We overhauled completely our electric, our kitchen, and 2.5 baths. We had to - I couldn't live with the floor to ceiling retro tiles in two of the bathrooms. Think pepto pink and a wierd burgundy colored powder room.

We did keep the claw foot iron bathtub on the third floor - just had it reglazed. It's beautiful and for that style - we'd pay an arm and a leg for one today.

Central NJ - the homes all look alike now. The custom arts and crafts (what we purchased), Federalist era homes, Victorian Era homes -

With love, elbow grease and investment are just stunning and sturdy.

IE I have plaster walls and heavy wood doors throughout. The chandelier in the dining room we had to update the electric on - you can't buy an antique like that for the $500 we had to pay to have someone restore it.

Our plumbing and foundation were excellent - and the woman's kids had put a new roof on it. Lucky me 0 my husband used to have another business (HVAC) and he's certified so that's a cost we don't have to worry about - just materials when it comes to it.

And I forced the purchase because if you break it - you buy it. Put my hand through one of the kitchen cabinets testing for weight (I have heavy day to day dishes we use) - put my little fist right through the bottom. The cabinets were circa the 1950's.

[Vinca]

15. Our antique home had the same whacko wallpaper in the kitchen.

We called it the "Laugh-In" wallpaper. It was olive green with huge orange and white flowers on it. The first morning I woke up in the house, before breakfast, I started pulling that stuff off. Then there was the striped metallic stuff in the half bath . . . LOL.

[JustAnotherGen]

25. Love it!

Ours was actually a pretty yellow - small floral - delicate but . . .

No - it wouldn't go with my french country kitchen - it had to go!

[liberal N proud]

27. Were the tiles in the bathroom plastic?

[JustAnotherGen]

28. No - they were porcelain

It took my husband and brother in law a full day on the upstairs (pepto pink) bathroom. And the bath tub was this wierd square shape but it wasn't 'fully' open. Imagine a diagonal "U" in the middle of it.

What was funny was the notes left behind by the contractors on the walls. They signed and dated them.

We also found old letters - a time capsule if you will in the third floor bathroom.

So - someday - maybe in 50 years someone will renovate our kitchen - and find copies of those letters as well as our 'time capsule' we left them. . . who we were, before after pics of the rooms thus far, why we bought the house, where we were from, etc. etc.

[logosoco]

18. When I cleaned houses for a living, there were a few homes,

usually an elderly man whose wife had died and he had no interest in decorating, where the house was just like it was when the wife died. After being in these places for a while, where everything looked like the 70s or the 80s, it was funny to go outside and see new cars and listen to new music. Being in them felt like I was transported back in time.

[Surya Gayatri]

19. Speaking of time capsules, have you seen this?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2323297/Inside-Paris-apartment-untouched-70-years-Treasure-trove-finally-revealed-owner-locked-fled-outbreak-WWII.html

[djean111]

20. Oh, I would move into that apartment in a heartbeat! Fantastic!

[Surya Gayatri]

21. I'm on the waiting list here in Paris! LOL!

But, I fear the rent is a little above my means.

[appalachiablue]

32. I've seen this & the video story of Boldini's French mistress whose granddaughter left the Paris

apartment in 1939 and never returned. Shades of 'Casablanca'. Quite a romantic mystery and time capsule. Some of the comments posted on the YouTube video site were interesting- how could there be Mickey Mouse stuffed toy characters there when Disneyworld didn't open until 1955?; how could an apartment be left alone for 70 years? Different generations. There has to be more info. about the relatives who paid for the Paris property all those years but I didn't pursue it.

The last time in France in 2004, in Paris I visited the Victor Hugo house museum briefly and the Museum of the City of Paris which had an interesting exhibit on Marlene Dietrich, esp. her apparel, and another on personal objects that belonged to the Romanov family of Czar Nicholas and Alexandra. Next trip it's the finally restored Picasso Museum in the Marais again, another stop at the Rodin and many more wonders in the City of Light.

[Surya Gayatri]

33. Wow, like nostalgia, history n' old stuff? Paris is your place!

And, that newly refurbished Picasso Museum is a 'bijoux'.

As for the Mickey Mouse toys, Mickaaay (French pronunciation) has been popular here since the 1930s. They didn't wait for Disneyland-Paris to discover him.

It IS one of those stories that keep you wanting more, isn't it? Delicious mystery.

[appalachiablue]

34. The folks who commented about Disney are too young to remember that the animated cartoon

character of Mickey and others were created in 1928 well before D.world, as a quick Google search shows. I appreciate history and art, part of being a museum curator for 20 years. Can't get into obsessive nostalgia fixation or those who make a pastime of seeking out and visiting ghost sites, abandoned prisons and asylums to enthrall at the suffering spirits of the miserable. Far too ghoulish for me but whatevah.

The mystery of the time capsule apartment will be dispelled as more info. about the relatives and upkeep comes forth. But until then it's interesting to read of people's speculation about what happened to the young woman who fled the place and wartime Paris. Some of the stories are quite imaginative.

The mistress' son was illegitimate and I doubt that he and his daughter enjoyed a very comfortable life but ya never know in those post La Belle Epoch times. The artist Boldini was an old gent when he took up with the beautiful muse, who had had many other relationships. Their arrangement was fairly common then; looking forward to learning more over time. A lot of the Italian's painting isn't half bad, especially the portraiture.

[Surya Gayatri]

38. 'visiting ghost sites, abandoned prisons and asylums' is not

just a hobby, it's an occupation for some of these people. 1000s of videos on YouTube.

[appalachiablue]

39. I've only seen some of this through weird TV programs & a bit on YouTube.

No can do. Sorry to know it's so widespread. What a morose, macabre activity and pursuit especially for the young who are usually positive, bright and hopeful at that age. Suppose it fits in with much of the Zombie, Vampire aesthetic especially of the Gen Twilight group, also the pervasive interest in all things Apocalypse. One late night I caught a new, budget film about young tourists wandering somehow in Chernobyl, around abandoned decayed buildings, overgrown woods, etc. When they we're found by mutant wolves, and their car battery died I had to stop. Friends in San Diego know the producer, whatever, but this stuff creeps me out-

[Surya Gayatri]

40. 'Gen Twilight group' - that says it all...

[KittyWampus]

35. Mickey started as Steamboat Willie in 1928 and Fantasia (more recognizable version) in 1940.

[malthaussen]

22. Where I live, we've recreated the 70's.

Well, actually, since we've been living here since 1973, you could say it is all-original. Truth, the fridge still works and has not ever required repair.

-- Mal

[Surya Gayatri]

24. Well, I'll have you know that my fridge and cooker

both date from 1978. Still chugging along.

NO intention of buying the latest thing, no matter how gussied up with bells and whistles.

[cyberswede]

23. Love that!

My house was built in 1940, and I searched for a long time to find period drapes for my dining room. I finally found some on eBay - they're awesome (but they reeked of cigarette smoke when they arrived). I continue to pick up various 40s pieces when I can - though not as thoroughly as the woman in the article.

I'd love to do a totally retro kitchen, but too expensive.

[dembotoz]

26. currently kinda live in a place like that--my mom died last sept

and she was very much happy with not updating anything
if it ain't broken--child of the depression

old flooring, old countertops and furniture to die from not for

not vintage Tiffany more blue light clearance at kmart

need to update and maybe sell this place but damn
don't know where to start

[Surya Gayatri]

29. Good luck with that. Very unhappy task, clearing away the

life of a loved one.

[Arugula Latte]

43. If the house has good bones and is in a desirable area it might be better not to update yourself.

Recently relatives sold the house of another elderly relative. They didn't update it for sale, but a company came in, redid the kitchen and bathrooms, did some updating of surfaces (flooring, walls), cleaned up the yard, and flipped it for a nice profit. If it seems like it might need a total overhaul, it might be better to just clear it out and let someone else update and resell it.

I'm very sorry about your mother's death.

[OregonBlue]

30. The first link didn't work but I read down the page anyway. OMG, I have never looked at the Daily

Mail. It's even worse than the inquirer or the Star. Had a few good laughs this morning. Thanks.

[Surya Gayatri]

31. My pleasure. There are some other links down thread if that one doesn't work.

Here ya go:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3027968/The-women-ve-turned-homes-shrines-favourite-decade.html

[riderinthestorm]

44. I was so fascinated I had to go check out the Norfolk Control Tower B&B website

5 stars on Trip advisor!

Rave reviews

Here's the link to their website

http://www.controltowerstays.com/

Thanks for posting this. Loved it!

[Surya Gayatri]

46. My pleasure and thanks for the link. It looks like a unique place to stay!!

[AtomicKitten]

47. Mid-century furniture is tres popular in the Bay Area.

Finally got my grubby paws on a mid-century starburst clock on CraigsList in SF. Love the 50s era furniture, well most of it. I mix it in with modern furniture for my particular brand of funky eclectic.

[Surya Gayatri]

48. In France, too. I've seen similar things at

the 'marché aux puces' and you pay a premium for them.

[KatyMan]

49. Nice!

our decor is mostly mid century, with some 20s modernism (Kandinsky prints for artwork as an example)(reprints of course). We've been looking for a clock that will work above our TV and that one almost does it, but we'd prefer it have more color.