The Mid-Century/Danish thread

First of all I am a big fan of MidCenturyModern design. This past weekend I visited a local restorer of MCM furniture called "Golden Age Design". They had copies of this book for sale (which I had seen before) but decided I needed to purchase it because it mentions my maternal grandparents' residence that was a signature MCM home designed by noted Twin Cities architecture firm "Close Associates". Sadly, this unique home was razed in 2012, but I have many photographs and a few pieces of furniture from this favorite childhood haunt.

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In future posts I'll share more photos of the original furnishings that I own from this house or from this era.

Lastly, a link to the official CLOSE ASSOCIATES web site.

http://www.closearchitects.com/duff.shtml
 
This is my favorite MCM find. Sold it to a member here I think in Texas. Doubt I will ever see another.

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First of all I am a big fan of MidCenturyModern design. This past weekend I visited a local restorer of MCM furniture called "Golden Age Design". They had copies of this book for sale (which I had seen before) but decided I needed to purchase it because it mentions my maternal grandparents' residence that was a signature MCM home designed by noted Twin Cities architecture firm "Close Associates". Sadly, this unique home was razed in 2012, but I have many photographs and a few pieces of furniture from this favorite childhood haunt.

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In future posts I'll share more photos of the original furnishings that I own from this house or from this era.

Lastly, a link to the official CLOSE ASSOCIATES web site.

http://www.closearchitects.com/duff.shtml

Most mid-century are poorly constructed and an ordeal to live in. Trust me, I know.
 
I’ve known a couple of folks with Eichlers. They are great to look at, but a challenge to live with. No where near enough electrical outlets for our time and next to impossible to add or maintain the wiring.
 
Try putting AC in an Eichler as well. You will end up with duct work running across the roof. My favorite style house but difficult to bring up to modern living standards.
 
Try putting AC in an Eichler as well. You will end up with duct work running across the roof. My favorite style house but difficult to bring up to modern living standards.

It all goes on the roof if it wasn't in the slab to begin with. AC, electrical, plumbing, gas, all additions go on roof.
 
Most mid-century are poorly constructed and an ordeal to live in. Trust me, I know.

Try putting AC in an Eichler as well. You will end up with duct work running across the roof. My favorite style house but difficult to bring up to modern living standards.

It all goes on the roof if it wasn't in the slab to begin with. AC, electrical, plumbing, gas, all additions go on roof.

I appreciate your comments, folks. Yes, when it came to updating the electrical and AC/heat systems my grandparents' house was a challenge bordering on a nightmare. It had AC from the beginning, so ducting wasn't an issue, but I remember when my grandmother replaced the original furnace she had to pay extra for a second furnace to feed the various duct circuits. Likewise, the original redwood siding was beautiful and aged well, but when an enthusiastic woodpecker attacked a corner of the housed during my childhood I remember helping to fill the holes with wood putty and the results were not pretty.
 
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Try putting AC in an Eichler as well. You will end up with duct work running across the roof. My favorite style house but difficult to bring up to modern living standards.
Childs play. Try putting a full blown cell site in a 3 story office building where all the post-tensioned concrete roof and floor decks are also the ceilings. No interstitial spaces. 21 antennas on the roof, each with (2) 7/8" coax and remote tilt cables to route through the roof deck along with refrigerant and power/control runs for redundant split 5 ton HVAC systems. Makes getting the 200A service 2" and the 4" telco conduit down to grade and out to the street look easy. Did 3 or 4 of those over the years.
For my favorite house type I'll take a Craftsman Bungalow and pray for no termites.
 
It's priced well beyond my budget, but I'd LOVE to have this George Nelson for Herman Miller "radio cabinet":

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It's been retrofitted with a Dual 1019 and a Marantz 2010. I could live with that, although I'd be inclined to swap in a George Nelson designed Rek O Kut B12GH in place of that Dual:

img_9378qzuw6.jpg
 
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I found this pic in a garage sale.....I have seen them in orange and red but I waited and found the funky green.

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Nice, love it!

Not really mid-century modern, but has a bit of a tiki feel to it (plus I really like it)...

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It's a hand carved African comb. You can buy them new in various styles, but I believe this one is an actual antique. Even the frame is hand made and appears to be quite old.
 
That "Listening Lounge" I wanted for the back room has turned into more of a Lounge/Home-Office with a mix of Industrial and Space Age design - a break from the hippie/groovy wood and orange and brown rest of the house.

*Flamesuit-On* I've broken the golden rule of MCM by using some reproductions, but I kinda needed to. Besides, there's another rule that goes along the lines of:

"The best way to pull off artificial plants is to mix real ones in with them."

And that's what I've done in a sense.

Overhead lighting is an original 1930s Kurt Versen Saturn pendant. I broke another rule there too, because I know original finishes are desired over refinished, but this lamp's paint was in such bad shape, and I'm almost certain it was leaded to boot, I ended up stripping it down and just shooting it with a few coats of flat white keeping it close to original. Aluminum mount and diffuser were cleaned, but left with original patina. Picked it up on eBay maybe 4 years ago from a seller who salvaged a few of them from a 1930s school that was being torn down in Illinois. Retrofitted a standard e27 socket, but all original wiring and mogul socket are in a bag with content ID.

Pic from original eBay listing (Before):

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And on my ceiling (After):

IMG_E7546.JPG

Next was a chrome and Lucite pendant lamp I had shipped in from Bulgaria (surprisingly pretty cheap to ship, too). The idea there was to flip it upside down and turn it into a desk lamp for my Space Age computer desk area (Yay! No more computer crap on my dining table! LOL). The most intriguing part was figuring out how I was going to get it to be a desk lamp. I started mentally going through the electrical aisles at my local hardware store, piecing together in my mind a suitable base for it.

But then it dawned on me; just get the cheapest donor lamp Amazon Prime will deliver to use as a donor for base/socket/wiring/switch. Six bucks in amazon warehouse deals was all it took for the solution there! Way better than cobbling something together! LOL

Pic from eBay listing (Before):

s-l1600.jpg

And after. Chrome cleaned, Lucite polished with some 3M microfininshing on the inside to get most of that yellowing out, then hit all over with a little Novus #1 plastic treatment, base/socket installed with a crystal clear 80W eqv. LED 'corn' bulb. Again, all original wiring/socket is kept in a labeled bag.

IMG_E7536.JPG

Over on the opposite wall from the computer desk/office is the 'Lounge' area. I've shown pics of these reproduction Eames bent-plywood table and chairs before somewhere in a thread (maybe this one) but here they are in their intended location. Please forgive the lack of curtains, they're in process. Until Wednesday of last week, this back bedroom was a giant walk-in (toss-in) closed door storage room that housed all the boxes of stuff I didn't want to deal with when I first moved to this house 4 years ago. The desk arrived, and lit the fire under me to go ahead and see how this room developed. That lamp has been mentioned in this thread earlier. It's a late 40s-early 50s Nelson bubble on its original teak and iron tripod. Wiring, socket, and plug were in good condition for their age, so they were not replaced. Inside is the only CFL bulb left in the house. I think is works nicely with the table and chairs and maybe even helps them not look so reproductiony.

IMG_E7556.JPG

There's more to this room, and it's coming together nicely (I'm sitting in it now as I type this), but it's still in process because I can't justify putting up pics of the rest of the area until it looks exactly how I want it. There's still some Op Art for the walls to go up and a table that's being shipped down from my mom's house, so we'll save the rest for a future post. But it's taking shape and gonna be awesome, I can tell you that! LOL
 
That "Listening Lounge" I wanted for the back room has turned into more of a Lounge/Home-Office with a mix of Industrial and Space Age design - a break from the hippie/groovy wood and orange and brown rest of the house.

*Flamesuit-On* I've broken the golden rule of MCM by using some reproductions, but I kinda needed to. Besides, there's another rule that goes along the lines of:

"The best way to pull off artificial plants is to mix real ones in with them."

And that's what I've done in a sense.

Overhead lighting is an original 1930s Kurt Versen Saturn pendant. I broke another rule there too, because I know original finishes are desired over refinished, but this lamp's paint was in such bad shape, and I'm almost certain it was leaded to boot, I ended up stripping it down and just shooting it with a few coats of flat white keeping it close to original. Aluminum mount and diffuser were cleaned, but left with original patina. Picked it up on eBay maybe 4 years ago from a seller who salvaged a few of them from a 1930s school that was being torn down in Illinois. Retrofitted a standard e27 socket, but all original wiring and mogul socket are in a bag with content ID.

Pic from original eBay listing (Before):

View attachment 1340735

And on my ceiling (After):

View attachment 1340736

Next was a chrome and Lucite pendant lamp I had shipped in from Bulgaria (surprisingly pretty cheap to ship, too). The idea there was to flip it upside down and turn it into a desk lamp for my Space Age computer desk area (Yay! No more computer crap on my dining table! LOL). The most intriguing part was figuring out how I was going to get it to be a desk lamp. I started mentally going through the electrical aisles at my local hardware store, piecing together in my mind a suitable base for it.

But then it dawned on me; just get the cheapest donor lamp Amazon Prime will deliver to use as a donor for base/socket/wiring/switch. Six bucks in amazon warehouse deals was all it took for the solution there! Way better than cobbling something together! LOL

Pic from eBay listing (Before):

View attachment 1340738

And after. Chrome cleaned, Lucite polished with some 3M microfininshing on the inside to get most of that yellowing out, then hit all over with a little Novus #1 plastic treatment, base/socket installed with a crystal clear 80W eqv. LED 'corn' bulb. Again, all original wiring/socket is kept in a labeled bag.

View attachment 1340740

Over on the opposite wall from the computer desk/office is the 'Lounge' area. I've shown pics of these reproduction Eames bent-plywood table and chairs before somewhere in a thread (maybe this one) but here they are in their intended location. Please forgive the lack of curtains, they're in process. Until Wednesday of last week, this back bedroom was a giant walk-in (toss-in) closed door storage room that housed all the boxes of stuff I didn't want to deal with when I first moved to this house 4 years ago. The desk arrived, and lit the fire under me to go ahead and see how this room developed. That lamp has been mentioned in this thread earlier. It's a late 40s-early 50s Nelson bubble on its original teak and iron tripod. Wiring, socket, and plug were in good condition for their age, so they were not replaced. Inside is the only CFL bulb left in the house. I think is works nicely with the table and chairs and maybe even helps them not look so reproductiony.

View attachment 1340743

There's more to this room, and it's coming together nicely (I'm sitting in it now as I type this), but it's still in process because I can't justify putting up pics of the rest of the area until it looks exactly how I want it. There's still some Op Art for the walls to go up and a table that's being shipped down from my mom's house, so we'll save the rest for a future post. But it's taking shape and gonna be awesome, I can tell you that! LOL

That all looks great. I especially like the pendant Saturn lamp. That came out looking very nice.
 
It's priced well beyond my budget, but I'd LOVE to have this George Nelson for Herman Miller "radio cabinet":

00g0g_2p1gZjnsAMS_1200x900.jpg


00g0g_79fjMXEdpRQ_1200x900.jpg


00101_a1gppIKLRWq_1200x900.jpg


00l0l_e1QoFSOEKt0_1200x900.jpg


00606_aihUjrT7Ysn_1200x900.jpg


00M0M_kOmsvkXQB83_1200x900.jpg


00m0m_chBWyUDUsd6_1200x900.jpg


It's been retrofitted with a Dual 1019 and a Marantz 2010. I could live with that, although I'd be inclined to swap in a George Nelson designed Rek O Kut B12GH in place of that Dual:

img_9378qzuw6.jpg
George Nelson designed the B-12GH? This explains why I've always loved them! I need to find another one, it would be a perfect match to the amp in my avatar
 
That all looks great. I especially like the pendant Saturn lamp. That came out looking very nice.

Thank you. If you’re interested, there’s a listing on eBay right now for another of these lamps from the same salvage. They’re describing it as from a warehouse, but in communication when I bought mine, it came from a school just north of Elgin they were tearing down. The seller even used a pic from the listing I bought from as one in their listing. Mine came from a seller in Elgin who actually did the salvage, and this seller is in SC, so I don’t know why it’s 1000 miles away, but it’s there for sale. Looks like they’ve maybe even got 2 of them. They’re a cinch to hang, and clean up real nice. ;)

Underside view of mine:

D2165E07-AF1E-4944-B31B-13B505BC887D.jpeg

I’ve got a bigger globe-style LED bulb on its way. Normal sized bulbs are dwarfed by the mogul bulbs that were originally in them and look undersized for the fixture. I looked at mogul LEDs before switching out the socket, but I’m not trying to light a gymnasium in a 10x10 room! LOL
 
Thank you. If you’re interested, there’s a listing on eBay right now for another of these lamps from the same salvage. They’re describing it as from a warehouse, but in communication when I bought mine, it came from a school just north of Elgin they were tearing down. The seller even used a pic from the listing I bought from as one in their listing. Mine came from a seller in Elgin who actually did the salvage, and this seller is in SC, so I don’t know why it’s 1000 miles away, but it’s there for sale. Looks like they’ve maybe even got 2 of them. They’re a cinch to hang, and clean up real nice. ;)

Underside view of mine:

View attachment 1340956

I’ve got a bigger globe-style LED bulb on its way. Normal sized bulbs are dwarfed by the mogul bulbs that were originally in them and look undersized for the fixture. I looked at mogul LEDs before switching out the socket, but I’m not trying to light a gymnasium in a 10x10 room! LOL

Thanks!
 
George Nelson designed the B-12GH? This explains why I've always loved them! I need to find another one, it would be a perfect match to the amp in my avatar

Here's an ad with the man himself:

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More here: http://www.georgenelsonfoundation.org/george-nelson/works/rek-o-kut-and-audax-145.html

Rek O Kut was a big player in the broadcast market, but when they decided to enter the home market, they hired George Nelson to give their products a make over to look more stylish and more appropriate in the living room of an upscale home.
 
Found this German Mauther Swingtronic 4hz at Sally Ann today for $1.50. Nice heavy brushed aluminum from the 60's/70s. The gears are jammed so I think I will just replace the funky PC board movement with a quartz one.


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