Nov 30, 2010

Divine Dining

We have a pretty little dining room with a pretty little picture window that looks out to my neighbour's house. Picture windows were of utmost importance in the early design of mid century modern houses in Calgary. And according to Thomas Hine, "was not only a way of looking out on one's achievement, but a way of looking in..." Proud home owners carefully selected key items to 'display' in their picture windows - a showcase of their modernity and rising middle class affluence. Nowadays me and the girls prefer to showcase our dancing and lip syncing skills in our picture window. And certainly not to anyone's benefit in the neighbourhood...

The painting is by my friend Tanya - a native Calgarian who moved to Montreal a few years ago.

Dining rooms are going by the way of the dinosaur in new houses. Too formal. No need for two tables. Well, we love our little dining room, with its laminated plywood walls and sweet detailing on the ceiling.

When we first moved into the house this window had original mustard yellow curtains and no blinds. We hired a blind company to help us find a replacement for this and the living room window. We tried every colour and style and you know what ended up working this best for this wall of wood? Exactly the same colour as the wall.

We did very little to update this room and apart from the blinds and a coat of paint, we changed out the light to one we purchased at the Bad Teak Store last January in New Westminster (I think the owner prefers Mid Century Modern HOME).

Both hubby and I like our dining room table - circa 20-dark furniture, but we would like to start collecting fun MCM classic chairs to replace the boring leather parsons. Heeelllllloooo Kit and Mid Century Dweller! I've been so good this year. Swearzies.


Vintage light of one that looks a leetle bit like this


Some pictures of brick walls from a past trip to San Fran


Glass fishing balls and some thrifting finds

Doorway to the kitchen


Secret pocket door - not sure why anyone would feel the need to close doors to the kitchen. Maybe if I was making a birthday cake or wrapping some presents? I need to do some research on this - will keep you posted.


LP


7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Glass fishing floats! Nice to see you still have them. :)

Laura said...

Of course. They're from dear friend...

Anonymous said...

I think the reason for the door is to keep kitchen smells out of the rest of the house. My parents own a very similar MCM home to this in South Calgary/Bankview and my father (who hates cooking smells) likes both doors (one of which is a pocket door like this one) to the kitchen kept closed when my mom is in there cooking. I'm really enjoying reading your blog and following along on your renovations - and just may pass along a few kitchen/bathroom reno suggestions to my parents!

Laura said...

That does make perfect sense. I use mine mainly to trap in wee kids running into the living room with bananas. Thank you for reading!

Unknown said...

hi! stumbled upon your blog somehow. we have pocket doors in our mid century kitchen--my husband likes to close them when the dishwasher is running...

Laura said...

Hi Julia,

Thanks for stumbling and introducing me to your blog! I do really like having separate spaces in the house.

Unknown said...

You can see them here: http://1088churchill.blogspot.com/2011/01/kitchen-related-photos.html

Our layout looks similar!

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