Modern 50 - Houses Invitation!

We received a letter from the Modern Architecture preservation Project of Tucson (MAPP) informing us that our home has been nominated as a candidate for the program. The group is gathering information on 100 historic homes in Tucson through photos, plans, and other publications and will be viewing our home sometime in May. The awards program is entitled Modern 50 - Houses and will identify 50 "exceptional and unique Modern homes built in Tucson during the mid-20th century." We're pleased to be invited to participate and are so thankful that the group is willing to wait until our kitchen project is completed before they come to view the house! If you'd like more information about the project you can visit http://mapptucson.org. to see an article from the Arizona Daily Star on the Modern 50 for commercial and institutional buildings you can visit http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/byauthor/305770.

Wish us luck!!!

Kitchen Curtain Idea

My husband's mother and father passed away this fall and while cleaning out their home he found these lovely little hand-embroidered towels. We're sure they were never used. His mom had folded them and carefully placed them in her cedar chest. Who knows? They may have been a wedding gift. I love old kitchen towels but I never know what to do with them since they're just too nice to use. I've decided to make a valance for our large kitchen window with these. The view from this window is just too nice to cover up with full curtains. I'm not sure how I'm going to make these yet. I almost hate to cut up the towels. Fortunately, I have some time to think about this project since our kitchen cabinets haven't been installed yet. Here are photos of the towels.

The Wicker Furniture

My husband tells the story of purchasing this set of wicker furniture in Minnesota for some ridiculous price (maybe $25??) from an elderly woman who was having a yard sale. He dragged them to Arizona in the 70s and stored them in a friend's garage where a dog chewed on them and they were subjected to other indignities. Needless to say, they were in rather rough shape. They are lovely, however, and I could see that they had great potential but they were unsafe for sitting and needed quite a bit of work. I've done some chair caning and basket weaving in the past but I felt unqualified for this job so I took them to a local wicker furniture repair shop on Fourth Avenue to have them repaired. I can't tell you how much this cost because I'll end up having another panic attack. Let's just say that it was far from cheap. The owner of the shop also talked me into buying another little chair that matched our set pretty closely. The wicker is so old that they no longer make the same size so the guy in the shop had to use a slightly larger size but it's really hardly noticeable. I painted the chairs white and made some custom cushions for them. The paint is not staying on the chairs very well, unfortunately, and keeps chipping off. I had to use spray paint since there are so many little nooks and crannies in the design.

I thought they might be Heywood/Wakefield but I've never been able to verify this. I purchased a book on their wicker furniture and there is some that is close in design but not identical. What do you think?

The Little Back Porch

When we first moved into the house there was a little covered porch on the north end of the "very long room" where we stored anything we didn't have room for at the time, primarily my husband's tools. After he added a workshop to the west side of the carport for his tools we decided to turn this covered porch into a screened-in porch. Here are photos of the project and the end result. My husband had collected some lovely antique wicker furniture when he lived in MN. I paid a small fortune to have the furniture repaired and painted them white. They look so nice on this porch and add a feminine touch.

Solar Features of our home

Arthur T. Brown, the architect who designed our home, was one of the pioneers in early passive solar design in Arizona. Our home, built in 1949, has a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows facing south with a huge, very thick wall opposite them which collects heat in the winter and radiates it around the east end of the house. The only challenge to this design is that the windows are single pane and not insulated. They are extremely large so we can't afford to replace them. We have plans to make insulated shades for them and these are in progress. We have added solar panels to the roof to continue the architect's dedication to solar design. Here is a link to a solar website that mentions Arthur T. Brown. I believe that the home they reference is The Hirsch House but I don't have any verification of this yet. There is a book, published by the U of A Press, about the architecture of Art Brown that was given to us by the previous owner but we have managed to misplace it. Our home is featured as are many other buildings, both residential and commercial. Here's a link to the solar website. http://www.azsolarcenter.org/tech-science/solar-architecture/solar-building-design-in-arizona.html

A Mid-Century Design Website

My blog now has a link on a website called "Retrorenovation". This is a very interesting site with lots of photos, links to other blogs, chats, and other forums related to mid-century living. Check it out. http://www.retrorenovation.com

The Retro Ceiling Fan

Here's a photo of the totally cool ceiling fan that was in the ceiling of our kitchen. Much to our amusement, when we broke into the ceiling we discovered that the fan was never vented to the outside through the roof. Fortunately, the fan didn't work so we never experienced the results of this "mistake". We love the look of the fan so my husband took the motor to Hemco (a great place to take old motors for a "tune-up") to see if it was worth fixing. They simply cleaned the motor really well and it started working perfectly. This fan has so much power that it could easily remove a body part if one isn't careful. We had planned to put the fan over the stove before we decided to get the new cabinets but there is a fabulous, modern stove hood with fan included in the cabinets that we are purchasing so now we're trying to think of a way to include the fan in the design of the kitchen. I think it looks like an ornament that one might find on the front an antique car.

The First Stage - Kitchen

During the first stage of our kitchen project, before we'd even thought about adding new cabinets, my husband installed this fabulous countertop of black granite tiles. Since we wanted to extend the countertop out into the dining room through the new opening we knew that we could never afford to have a custom, solid granite countertop made. I enjoy baking and canning so we needed this space to be quite large and the original counter space just wasn't large enough. The black granite looks so elegant and is perfect for spreading out all of the utensils and ingredients for a large cooking project. The tiles have little gold specks that really stand out when they are highly polished. The challenge will be to install the new cabinets below this countertop without damaging it. We'll need to cut an angle into one corner for the corner cabinet (with a lazy susan!) and cutting and installing angled tile to finish the top. I feel so fortunate to be married to a man who has the ability to do this kind of work himself. He runs his own computer business during the week so projects can take a while to get completed but, considering the money we save and the attention to detail that he gives to each project, it is well worth the wait!

The New Kitchen Cabinets

After weighing the advantages or disadvantages of keeping the old metal cabinets in our kitchen we have decided to replace them. Because we are on a very strict budget for this project the options were slim. Our nephew is a cabinet maker so we explained our needs to him and gave him a list of all of the features that we thought were important to make our kitchen look like it belongs in our mid-century house and that would create a functional space for someone who likes to cook. Building custom cabinets was one of the options but the estimated cost was just not realistic for our budget. So, our nephew suggested that we explore the option of purchasing a display model from a cabinet display store. He has since found the perfect set of cabinets at Southwest Kitchen and Bath and has arranged for us to purchase a discontinued set of display cabinets at a price that is just within our budget. The owners of this store have been most helpful and are interested in the history of our house and in our efforts to update it. Here are some photos of the lovely display. Our nephew will be removing the cabinets from their display and installing them in our kitchen in early February and we are so excited! Some preliminary work will need to be done first, including finishing off the ceiling, painting, and installing some doors on other cabinets that will match the new doors. These cabinets are of sizes that are not included in the display and we can't afford to purchase pre-made doors to match the new ones so we'll be looking for laminate that either matches or compliments the new doors.

Here's a link to Southwest Kitchen and Bath in Tucson: http://www.southwestkitchen.com/

My favorite "found object"

Here is my favorite object in the "barrio garden". My husband hauled this bicycle out of the mountains during a hiking trip. It's quite sturdy and heavy in spite of the rust. The challenge when collecting found objects for the garden is knowing when to stop. I have many items in our side yard that are unused at this point including a couple of bowling balls that I plan to cover with mosaic tile pieces and to display in one of my future garden beds. That's yet another project to add to my long list!

The Backyard "Death Zone"

Here is a photo of our backyard when we first moved in. The "landscaping" included a clump of ugly aloe, three grapefruit trees, a fruiting olive tree, and miscellaneous parched weeds. We ended up removing one of the grapefruit trees that was beyond saving and we thought we would need to remove another one but once we started watering the trees all of them perked up and now look full and lovely. The grapefruit trees provide delicious fruit and there are usually olives on the olive tree although we don't use them. The trees provide great shade and create a little "outdoor room" for seating during the heat of summer. Since I enjoy gardening I have added a vegetable and herb garden and have created a "barrio garden" under the trees for container plants. Since this area is shady and cooler during the hot months I have added houseplants and succulents as well as herbs such as ginger, bay, and cardamom. I enjoy using "found objects" as accents in this garden. The photo to the right shows the backyard as it now stands but, of course, we have plans to change things in the future. We will build raised garden beds (it gets harder and harder to bend over as I age), an outdoor kitchen, and also to plant an orange tree. I'd also like to cover a portion of the wall with a tile mosaic. This yard is quite large so this photo is only of the western end. Notice that the clump of aloe is also gone. It was so hideous and unfriendly. A person could have been killed tripping over it in the dark!

The Cool "Murphy Kitchen"

One of the things we really loved about the house when we first saw it was the little "Murphy Kitchen" that is located in the spare bedroom in the north end of the addition. We assume that this room was built to be a mother-in-law suite since it includes many built in drawers in the bathroom, a built in dressing table, two closets, and the little kitchen unit in another closet. The unit includes a stove top and oven, refrigerator, sink, and cabinets. Everything but the refrigerator is in working order. This room has become my husband's computer-building space so the closet containing the little kitchen is blocked by computer parts now. You can see the bathroom in the background. The handles on the cabinets are in two pieces and when the cabinets are closed they form a circle. We really lilke this. We haven't done anything to this room to change it other than to add a desk, shelving, and work counters.

The very long room

This room was originally a breezeway between the original house and the carport. In the 60s the owner commissioned Arthur T. Brown to design an addition to the west of the house that would enclose the breezeway and carport. The carport has become two spare bedrooms and the breezeway is now what we call "the very long room". When we first moved in we used the south half of the room as a dining room and the north half (where the shelving is) as the t.v. area. Unfortunately, there is a step down between the kitchen and this room and the room is fairly closed off from the kitchen as well making it awkward to move easily between the two rooms when serving food, etc. The fireplace divides the two ends of the room so we decided it would function better as a living room. We have moved all of the living room furniture into this room but that's about it. We spend a lot of time thinking about how we will eventually decorate and arrange furniture to make it look less like a hallway and more like a comfortable space. We ask all of our visitors to join us in the contemplation as well and someday I'm sure someone will have an idea that we love. Until then, we live with it as is.

The Kitchen

Here's what the kitchen looked like when we purchased the house. Before we even moved in we completely removed all of the tile, counters and floor. Whoever had installed this tile had done a very poor job. We also cut a hole in the wall that separated the kitchen from what is now the dining room. The kitchen was once a sad, dark little room that felt like an "afterthought". Oh yeah, we also got rid of the vertical blinds on the window. The small photo is how the kitchen looks now. We thought long and hard about whether or not to keep the original cabinets. We have finally decided to replace them with new, more functional cabinets that are appropriate in style for the age of the house. A separate blog will be created about this project.

The Dining Room

Here is a view of our dining room. We had originally set this room up as the living room. We didn't like that set up because there is a set of steps between the other room and the kitchen and that made it awkward to pass food, dishes, etc. to the dining room. We painted the cabinets in the background but we have discovered that there are so many layers of paint on them now that they don't close properly. We have plans to strip them down to the bare wood, which is actually quite lovely. Two of these cabinets are pull-down desk tops with cute little drawers and shelves inside. The hardware is worn and one hinge is broken. Another project for another time!!!

Our Mid-Century Home - A Project on a Shoestring Budget

We purchased this home about 6 years ago in central Tucson. It was designed by renonwed local architect Arthur T. Brown and was built in 1949. Mr. Brown was quite ahead of his time with this design, including passive solar elements and post-and-beam construction. The story goes that the homeowner, a Mr. Hirsch, was unable to obtain a loan for the build due to its unique its unique design. He decided to have the home built anyway. We've been told that the home used to be featured during tours of "architecturally interesting" houses at one time but when we purchased it the house was in need of some TLC. The previous owners did not appreciate its unusual features so we've been told. We immediately saw that the house had immense potential when our real estate agent opened the door and, in spite of the fact that we were really looking for a home that was "move-in" ready, we fell in love with it. And so begins our labor of love.