Siedler's 'house of the future' - 1954

In May 1954 the 'house of the future' was unveiled at the Architectural and Building Exhibition in the Sydney Town Hall.

Testing the assembly of the 'future house' at the factory in NSW

Architect Harry Siedler planned the streamlined house as a solution to post-war the housing crisis in Australia.  As typified the mid-century modern trend in the US (where Siedler had studied), he wanted to replace 'wasteful' handicraft methods with a streamlined steel frame assembled from machine made parts.

A one bedroom home was built for display purposes, but Seidler's design was flexible enough to allow for different sixes and configurations.

  

In each design though is a north facing wall made entirely out of plate glass, specially designed to let in the light but repel the heat - partly fixed and partly in sliding frames.  Long metal sunshades and an insulated roof space would also protect the home from to much heat and glare.

Other innovative features included a kitchen unit incorporating a fridge, sink, stove and garbage disposal unit, and pre-fabricated bathroom unit with a shower, basin, toilet, flooring and walls.

Harry Siedler also designed the interiors and furniture for the 'house of the future.' 

For more posts on Harry Siedler, see here.

Build for Your Needs

I have a growing collection of mid-century magazines, including issues of House and Garden.  I thought today I'd share an article (from the Sept. 1950 issue, by Douglas J Birrell) about building a house for needs, rather than wants, as we seem to do today.   In Australia in the 1950s most people saved and paid upfront for their homes - and many built their own.  Not many people had mortgages.  How I wish!   This short article shares some tips and ideas for building a basic 'nucleus' of a house that can be extended as needed.

Happy Birthday Eero Saarinen

Eero Saarinen (August 20, 1910 – September 1, 1961) was one of my favourite mid-century designers.

Hailing from Finland, Saarinen emigrated to the US when he was thirteen, and studied furniture design and sculpture at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan, where his father was a teacher. His fellow students included Charles and Ray Eames, and Florence Knoll (née Schust).

Eero Saarinen  c. 1937 via

He was also an architect and interior designer, having studied architecture in both Paris and at Yale, and loved simple, modern designs with sweeping curves. Such as this.

reception desk by Saarinen via

MCM Audette House and Castlecrag

Today a look at an iconic Australian mid-century home, Audette House, designed in 1953 by Peter Muller.

Born in Adelaide on 3 July 1927, Peter Muller graduated in Architectural Engineering in 1948.  He was the first architecture recipient of The United States Education Foundation  Fulbright scholarships in 1950, and did post-graduate study in Philadelphia. On his return to Sydney in 1952 the chairman of the Foundation, Mr. Hauslabe, and his step-son Bob Audette approached Mullerr and asked him to design a solar - efficient house for their block in the Sydney suburb of Castlecrag - they thought that with Peter having been in the US for his studies he would understand Colonial architecture. Instead, Muller presented them with this modern model and plans:

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40s Design - Scalamandre's Zebra

Continuing with my zebra theme, this week a look at zebra's in design, and in particular on walls.

 The Town House Hotel in Los Angeles was built in 1929 and was designed  by Norman W. Alpaugh.  It was once among the most luxurious hotels in Southern California.  It's "Zebra Room", featuring zebra murals and zebra patterned crockery, opened 1937 or 38.

Zebra room diners

African adventurers such as Martin and Osa Johnson had helped to make safari themes popular in the 1930s.

Osa Johnson

A couple of years later, in New York, new arrival Gino Circiello opened his restaurant, Gino's.  He was helped with his business by Franco Scalamandre, who was known to help Italian Americans get their financial footing.  Circiello chose a zebra design wallpaper for his restaurant walls,  a creation of Scalamandre's wife, Flora.  "I chose it because I love to hunt," Circiello says, "and it is something that people will remember."

It certainly is memorable!

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Scalamandre has just reissued their classic Zebra wallpaper in new vibrant colours,although I think I like the black and white version best.

Wall paper chic

If you don't want to wall paper your home, there is always the Scalamandre Zebra Tote.

Scalamandre Zebra Tote.

Or the silk scarf.

Or even home wares - Scalamandre teamed up with Lenox for their new collection, which unfortunately is available exclusively at Bloomingdale’s. 

I love the dinner setting.  I could have my own zebra room.....

Scalamandre by Lenox Zebras 5-Piece Place Setting

At $216.60 per five place setting, may be not any time soon. But a girl can dream.....

Deb xx

Dress of the week - Charles James, 1939

I have been looking at some lovely classic cars from the late 1930s lately, Like this one.

1938 Riley Big Four Redfern Saloon Tourer by Maltby

This car is English, and I can imagine driving in this car, going off to a cocktail party, perhaps wearing this silk cocktail dress designed by American- English designer Charles James in 1939.

Charles James, 1939

Thursday thoughts - Happy Birthday with a Puegeot

Today is my husband Peter's birthday, and if I had the money, I would buy him one of these.

Peugeot / RCZ / 1.6 147kW coupe

Or possibly a new 407 - he has a ten year old model at present, which he loves. Lots.  Although I would prefer one of these myself.

The Peugeot 601 Éclipse,1934

Isn't it stunning?! The 601 was Peugeot’s largest and most expensive car at the time, with a 2148cc six and the world’s first retractable hardtop. Designer Georges Paulin came up with the idea, and coach builder Pourtout built it. Paulin was not a professional designer, but actually a dentist, whose passion for cars had led him to develop a retractable metal roof mechanism.  Initially Peugeot considered it too complicated, so Paulin and Pourtout purchased some bare chassis and constructed the cars, christened “Eclipse,” on their own. It was so popular that Peugeot acquired the patents in 1935.

Three ladies dressed in the fashion of the 1930s with a Peugeot 601.

Peugeot is now part of PSA Peugeot Citroën, but the original family business of Peugeot was founded in 1810, manufacturing coffee mills and bicycles. Emile Peugeot applied for the lion trademark in 1858, and in 1889 the firm showed its first passenger car - a Serpollet-powered steamer (basically a steam powered tricycyle) - at the "universal exposition" held in Paris. 

 

In 1890 came a Type 2 Peugeot, this time with an internal-combustion engine built in France under license from Gottlieb Daimler. The Peugeot company and family is originally from Sochaux, France, and they still have a large manufacturing plant and  Museum there.

The Peugeot factory in Sochaux, France, 1930s

Since 1930, Peugeot had begun labeling its models the 201, 301, 401, and 601. When the new 1935 Peugeot 402 was introduced at the Paris Auto Show in the Grand Palais, it was recognized that the '2' represented the beginning of a quite different generation of passenger cars.

The 1935 Peugeot 402

1938 Peugeot 402. 

The 402 front end became the signature of the 1930’s Peugeot, and the car’s streamlined styling earned it the nickname “fuseau Sochaux” or, the “Sochaux rocket”.  I love the unusual, side-by-side headlamps positioned behind the sloping grille - but I do wonder if it impeded the light it sent out.

1938 Peugeot 402, front end

Peugeot’s used the traditional “body on frame” construction, with three different chassis lengths, that made it possible to offer 16 different body types.  Other options included recessed “safety” door handles, automatic transmission and a diesel engine. The art deco influence was obvious in 402, but if the standard sedan was radical, the 402 Cabriolet was an ultra-modern - almost futuristic - realization. Look at the curves on this compared to the 1934 model above.

1938 Peugeot Darl’mat Leger 'Special Sport' Roadster.

A year after the 1935 Peugeot 402 was introduced, its basic styling was extended to a new, smaller 302. I don't want to be greedy - I could make do with the 302 model really.

1936 Peugeot 302

Of course then they also brought out a 202.

1938 ad for 202 Peugeot car

"Here is the pretty Berline 202, 4 seats, 4 doors, fast (100 km/h), economic (6 to 8 litres/100 km), as safe and robust as a big car, ideal in town and on the highway."

Peugeot stopped producing cabriolets and convertibles with the outbreak of war in 1939, but did produce light commercial van and utility variants of the 402 during World War II.

A Puegeot 402 in war paint, WWII 

In 1945 production of the Peugeot 202 was resumed, and by it's end in 1949 more than 100,000 cars were built. Then it was replaced with the 203. The 403 began production in 1955.

(This year you'll just have to make do with some pictures, honey. Happy Birthday!)

Deb xx

Seeing Stars - 1930s Design

In yesterday's post there was a picture of Chanel's Comète necklace from 1932 - which I loved.  Today, some more stars from the 30s. Shapes that is, not the Hollywood version.

1930s Star-Shaped Crystal Chandelier by Weinstein

3 Italian Star Shaped Lanterns, Venice, 1930s

1930s Star Brooch

The Texeco Star, c. 1930s

Crochet small Swedish tablecloth star about 1930

 1930s Knitted Star Beret

I love the beret, and the pattern is available on Etsy. hmmm....

Deb xx

Dress of the Week - Grecian, 1930s, Madame Grès

Grecian” evening gown, blue silk jersey, c. 1937

Madame Alix Gres, (1903-1993) was born Germaine Emilie Krebs in Paris. She began as a sculptor, and then designed fabric, before turning her hand to fashion design.  Her training as a sculptor influenced her clothing designs - using mainly silk jersey she draped and pleated directly on the model or client in the classical Greek style, with few visible seams.

Madame Gres draping, c. 1930s

Her first fashion house in Paris was called simply 'Alix", and her simple draped designs quickly gained publicity in fashion magazines. By the time the Germans invaded Paris, Madame Gres had become  world famous, and despite being Jewish  German officers asked her to design dresses for their wives.    She refused and they closed down her design house.

Evening dress

 spring/summer 1938

In the late 1930s, she married Serge Czerefkov, sold the rights to the name Alix and adopted Gres from her husband’s first name, spelled backwards.  She opened her new house, Grès, in 1942, and her designs became even more Grecian in appearance. The dresses took hundred's of hours to make, in one or two pieces of fabric and each pleat was done by hand, molding to the wearer. 

Her designs were expensive due to the hours each took, but she despised mass production and thought of herself as a true artist.  Her career spanned five decades, and in the 1950s, she began “tailoring” women’s suits, but still continued with her famous draping in her dresses.

A Gres suit, 1950-51

Dress

 fall/winter 1977

She sold the business in the 1980s, and when it went under a Japanese fashion distributor bought the name, which became very successful in Japan, and still pays homage to Madame Gres by continuing the draping style in a more modern way.

You can see more of her designs here.

Deb xx

Australian Travel posters of the 1930s

You will have seen by previous posts that I love 1930's travel posters.  The French posters are incredible, and there are also some great American posters.   Today, though, I am featuring Australian Posters from my home state of Queensland.  In the 1930s the Queensland Intelligence and Tourist Bureau commissioned a range of posters by Eileen Mayo, Percy Trompf and James Northfield to attract holiday makers from the south to the 'paradise' in the north.  You may remember Paul Hogan's 1980's 'Put another Shrimp on the barbie' campaign, or seen the more recent 'Where the bloody hell are you' campaign. Personally I preferred the thirties, when all you needed to make a lasting impression was a nice beach, some pineapples, a cute girl and some fish.

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I imagine the the bright, colourful, optimistic pictures had wide appeal, especially during the Depression.   and in the 1930s his posters attracted lots of attention overseas.

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This poster is very similar to WWI and WWII recruitment posters - just imagine he's saying "where the bloody hell are you!"

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My favourite poster is this one, produced in 1935 for the Queensland Government Tourist Bureau.   ‘The Sunshine Route’ includes various destinations such as Brisbane, Gympie, Great Sandy Island, Maryborough, Bundaberg, Gladstone, Rockhampton, and my home town of  Mackay.

The artist Percy Trompf (1902-1964) was born in Victoria, Australia and began his commercial artistic career designing confectionery packaging. He also designed thousands of advertising posters but the widespread recognition of his posters for the Australian National Travel Association and the Victorian Government Railway is probably what he is most known for.

Do they make you want to visit?

Deb xx