Tabla de contenidos para Spring - Summer 2017 en Early Homes

Welcome to homes from Cape Cod to North Carolina in this wide-ranging issue of Early Homes—our biannual special edition from the publishers of Old House Journal. A theme emerged: revival interpretations of American tradition. First up is a 1949 garrison Colonial (p. 14) by the architect Royal Barry Wills. The Connecticut garden (p. 30) began with a formal period layout. Our visit to a historic house museum (p. 56) delivers an interesting twist: the Massachusetts house is quite old, built in 1780, but it was moved and Colonial Revival-ized by an antiques collector in 1936, giving us an example of Old Colonies Style with upgraded finishes, fireplaces, and hooked rugs. a I learned about a new vernacular form: the Pennsylvania stove-room house (p. 40), a variation of the German Continental…

Yes, it’s a fact: Early in our history, those with the means to buy painted finishes chose bright colors like the fabled Prussian blue used by George Washington. Their alternatives—earthy, ground pigments mixed with minerals and binders— tended to be both similar to and harmonious with the colors found in building materials like stone and brick. Nothing flashy, in other words. That said, even historical palettes based on earth pigments are surprisingly varied. This is especially so considering the tints come from about eight core colors, sourced either from iron oxide or copper. The warm hues so familiar to us from early American applications— brown, burnt orange, tawny red and pink, rich tan, and yellow—come from iron oxides like ochre, umber, and sienna. Copper is the basis for many blues…

Items not listed may be widely available, out of production, or antique. Mid-century Authentic pp. 14–20 DESIGNERS LRV Designs (919) 427-7314 Vuncannon Designs (919) 427-7374 CABINETS Plain & Fancy plainfancycabinetry.com REPRODUCTIONS The Seraph theseraph.com LIGHTING (antique) The Saltbox, Greensboro, NC: (336) 273-8758 • (repro.) Authentic Designs authenticdesigns.com Period Lighting Fixtures periodlighting.com PAINT COLORS (terra cotta) custom Sherwin-Williams sherwin-williams.com • (paneling) ‘Pelham Gray’ Martin Senour martinsenour.com more sources FLOORING Colonial Plank Floors colonialplank floors.com Penn.-based supplier of distressed, brushed, handcrafted wood flooring FURNITURE Andersen & Stauffer andersenandstauffer.com Exact reproductions of 17th-, 18th-, and early 19th-century American antiques • D.R. Dimes drdimes.com Handmade colonial American furniture DECORATIVE Dunberry Hill Designs dunberry hilldesigns.com Traditional floorcloths in historic designs • Historic Housefitters historichouse fitters.com Pewter, decorative tinware & redware Farmhouse Lighting pp. 34–37 See also sources listed on p. 37. American Period Lighting americanperiodlighting.com • Circa…

Given its historical motifs, the architect’s famous name, and this owner’s perfect pitch, no wonder this garrison Colonial looks so authentic. The house is, nevertheless, a mid-20th-century reproduction built in North Carolina’s Piedmont, not far from Raleigh. The house, built in 1949, shows how comforting the style can be. Initially a straightforward, gable-end block with a jetty or overhang at the second floor (making it a garrison house), it’s a solid postwar example. The designer was Boston architect Royal Barry Wills (1895–1962), the renowned proponent of adapting traditional New England house designs, especially Capes (but also garrisons, saltboxes, and churches). These New England “Colonials” were modern, built with electric kitchens, ductwork, closets, and mid-century bathrooms. Their rooms interpret the good old days as, perhaps, we wish they had been. This…

The 1748 Benjamin Curtis House in Sandy Hook, Connecticut, sits on a quiet corner. The only close neighbor is the Pootatuck River that glides into Lake Zoar. It’s a far cry from Jean and Lincoln Sander’s previous place, a hilly road that became a truck route. Jean spends a lot of time gardening and was driven to distraction by the noise of brakes. “We moved to get some peace and quiet,” she says. The Curtis House needed extensive renovation, first on the agenda when the couple bought the two-acre property in 2002. As a former landscape designer, Jean knew exactly what she wanted outdoors, once the time came: space that would embrace her outward-bound family, in a setting that would include her collection of antique garden ornaments. Eventually she planned…

Built in the simple “stove room” layout*— just a hall (kitchen), stove room, and bedchamber on the first floor, with a half-storey above—this log dwelling dates to 1803. It had been nestled in Pennsylvania’s Cumberland County. By the time Harry McIntosh saw the house, though, its once-bucolic setting had been overtaken by modern development. Harry found a more sympathetic site in the midst of central Pennsylvania’s cornfields. Working with master carpenter Jim Stoner Jr., he moved the home in 1998 to the rural hamlet of Paradise. The Continental Plan House is a distinctive building type associated with early German settlement and found mostly in 18th-century Pennsylvania. The three-room floor plan is almost identical to the Penn or Quaker Plan House, with a large kitchen (kuche) room and two smaller side…

Farmhouse-style has become a catchphrase in design jargon, one that covers the ubiquitous (and British) apron-front sink, trestle dining tables, and flour-sack kitchen linens. The trend is nowhere as prevalent as in the current crop of lighting fixtures; those crafted from washtub aluminum and mason jars are everywhere. While such fixtures are clearly inspired by the simple, rustic lights found in rural farmhouses, it’s worth pointing out that neither aluminum nor manufactured glass jars were available during most of the 19th century, when the old farmhouses presumably were built. Restorers are looking for something more authentic. Like everything else in the pre- Industrial era, most light fixtures were fashioned from readily available materials: wood, tin, wire, and various kinds of glass, from clear to seedy to frosted. Fancier treatments included…

This new kitchen came about as part of the sympathetic renovation of a Connecticut farmhouse after a fire. The house was saved by the fire-resistant original plaster walls. But parts of it were severely damaged from smoke and water. Inspections would also turn up structural problems and areas that needed to be brought up to code. The main house was mostly intact. A small bath had been added many years ago upstairs at the end of a hall, and a kitchen added in the one-storey ell. “I saw a house with plenty of history to preserve,” says designer Sarah Blank, “yet it needed to be made functional in the 21st century.” Sarah’s clients, the Ross family, had an emotional tie to the old house and agreed to a preservation approach.…