Learn to love retro design with a fabulous celebration of twentieth-century design, color, and pattern in “Living Retro,” a new book from designer Andrew Weaving–a  private glimpse of delicious retro-inspired homes around the world from Palm Springs to Paris.

In his new book, “Living Retro” (published by Ryland Peters & Small), Andrew Weaving visits 18 lovely homes to showcase some of the best and most inspiring of retro design. The featured homes differ in style, but all highlight some of the most drool-worthy takes on retro design around. Spotlighted homes run the gamut from a minimalist loft in London to a chic ranch house in Palm Springs. Readers will also be treated to the simple elegance of a Scandinavian retreat in Denmark and a quirky New York apartment. This carefully curated tour around the globe illustrates the many facets of retro design and decor that includes both sophisticated glamour and simple living.

Each section is devoted to a different home and riffs on a central theme found in the home. The ideal way to read this book is to flip through the whole book looking at the delicious photos and then focus in on those chapters that speak to you. Chapter highlights include Graphic Glamour, Back at the Ranch, Best of British, Danish Delight, California Dreaming and more!

This book it not meant as a strictly adhered to design doctrine, but is actually intended to be an inspiration-filled resource to jumpstart your own creative design. “Living retro does not demand close adherence to any particular set of style rules,” writes Andrew Weaving in the introduction. “There are no limits other than the chronological parameters the look spans, roughly from the 1950s to the late 1970s. Instead, living retro is a multi-faceted look that ranges from sophisticated glamour to pared-down chic, allowing its followers to cherry-pick their favorite pieces from the cream of twentieth-century design.” Sounds dreamy and utterly divine.

Andrew Weaving is the owner of Century Design in London. The gallery specializes in mid-century modern design, focusing on both originals and re-editions, plus some work by new designers. His other books include “Understanding Modern”, “Playful Home” and the best-selling “Modern Retro” (also published by Ryland Peters & Small). A passionate collector of all things retro, Andrew lives in London and France and owns historic mid-century modern homes in Florida and Palm Springs as well as an Art Deco beach house in Essex.

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Vintage furniture is not only timeless and beautiful, but it’s also better for the environment. Choosing vintage and retro pieces will reduce the amount of consumer waste dedicated to buying new items only to be used for a short time, as well as keep perfectly good and oftentimes well-built furniture out of landfills.

If you recall our article on modular furniture, then you may remember the shocking municipal solid waste statistic from the EPA explaining that approximately 9,870 tons of furniture and furnishings were discarded in 2009 alone. This figure accounts for not only primary use, but of secondary, or second hand use, as well.

In other words, look for solid vintage pieces that have a lot of life left rather than cheaply made new items and you will be well on your way to owning an heirloom that you won’t want to throw out with Tuesday’s trash. Before we get to the good stuff, take a look ar our vintage furniture buying tips below:

• Try to buy only solid wood pieces, or items with (very little) salvageable veneer that can be painted or filled and restored.
• Look for drawers that have dovetail joinery – this resembles a puzzle piece that fits together really well.
• Look for brand stamps or stickers inside dresser drawers or underneath chair seats and Google the manufacturer – this can tell you a lot about the piece before buying.
• If it looks dilapidated and you don’t have any restoration or upholstery skills, then it’s probably best to keep on moving – you want the structure, frame, or “bones,” like a house, to be solid.
• There are vintage and retro retailers that will inflate prices. If you think it’s overpriced, after doing your research, then you can either discuss negotiating with the seller or simply cut your losses and move on – cash is a great bargaining tool.
• Try to avoid fakes and knock-offs. Herman Miller has been producing Eames chairs since the 1950s, however, the older the year and the better the condition is what determines its rarity and worth.
• If it has bugs or bug droppings proceed with caution or not at all, especially with upholstered items.
• Find vintage furniture at garage and yard sales, thrift stores, flea markets, auctions, antique stores, Craigslist, Etsy, eBay, and one of my favorites, estate sales.

Now that you’ve gotten some practical information under your belt for your next vintage furniture shopping trip, let’s have a little fun and take a look at some pieces for every room in the house.

Bedroom

Every bed could use a headboard to frame your linens and delineate your space nicely. Fretwork is a design feature that’s extremely popular in the interior design world, as well as in the vintage furniture realm, so we’ve chosen this king size Hollywood Regency style piece to accentuate your master suite.

Living Room

It’s nice to complete the living room with a conversation-oriented furniture layout, which is why we’ve suggested this pair of Cane Back Barrel Chairs. Pop these across from your sofa after repainting a reupholstering these beauties and you will have a great place to sit and chat with guests.

Dining Room

When entertaining guests it’s nice to have a serving area, like a buffet or sideboard in the dining room. Today, however, it’s perfectly acceptable and encouraged to mix and match your furniture, so why not opt for something fun and fresh like the upcycled Bassett 1970s vintage dresser-turned-credenza (or entertainment center, or whatever you wish) pictured above.

Kitchen

Eat-in kitchens are so charming and a small, round dining table can be the perfect complement to a breakfast nook, which is why we’ve chosen the solid teak Danish and Mid-Century inspired 1960s table by Sun Furniture. This would look great with a couple of chairs – and the best part is they don’t have to be an exact match for the table.

Office

Glam up your office with a vintage furniture find like the beautiful French Provincial Queen Anne desk with gold dipped legs. This would look stunning in a feminine space with a modern Lucite chair and a bold little accent pillow containing pops of color like pink, aqua, and orange.

Bathroom

Bring vintage vibes into your bathroom with a cool cabinet similar to the aqua blue metal filing cabinet from the 1940s/1950s pictured above. It has a pull-down glass display that would look so sweet filled with nicely folded hand towels or decorative items and a bottom space that could conceal toilet paper.

Let us know what you think about our vintage furniture finds on the EcoSalon Facebook page!

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Image of Mid Century Desk via Shutterstock

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Mid-century modern gets minimized.

Before going any further, a disclaimer: we are not on the verge of writing about dollhouses. These are mini modernist manses and mid-century inspired miniatures we’re blogging about here, a tribute to those of us who cannot afford and/or agree with our spouses on acquiring the full-size Saarinen we love so dear.

Thanks to the internet, we’ve been able to tap into the minds, closets and, okay, “dollhouses” of a different sort of design devotee to bring you 20 examples of mini-modernism at its most minimal (in stature), divided into two sections: architecture and furnishings. But remember, these are not dollhouses in the traditional sense. The mini-modernists that build and most probably obsess over them favor clean lines over opulent Victorian and streamlined interiors to stately Tudor. They strive to bring the Vitra back, put some Le Corbusier into it and infuse a little Eames into the drab of everyday.

For that we say, play on.

Architecture:

The Kaleidoscope House (also pictured above)

For mini-modernists, this out-of-issue toy house from the now-defunct Bozart Toys is, like, Graceland. Designed by architect Peter Wheelwright and artist Laurie Simmons in 2001, the collector’s item now sells for up to thousands of dollars.

The Edward House

Also covetable, the Edward House from brinca dada inspired by Neutra’s Kaufmann House and Gary Cooper’s home designed by A. Quincy Jones. Features glass corners, minimalist cut stone fireplace, hardwood floors, open floor plan and floor-to-ceiling windows. It bears mentioning that the mini-modernist abode is crafted with eco-friendly woods and non-toxic, lead-free paints.

The Bennett House

A truly tricked out miniature dream house that was influenced by the De Stijl movement of the early 20th century. The Bennett House is also a tribute to the Rietveld’s Schröder House. Referencing the iconic dutch structure, Architect Tim Boyle, who designed the mini-house, explains: “Townhouses are typically a stack of floors with a few windows on each floor, and no inside/outside relationship. I prefer architecture that reveals structure and engineering, hence windows extend past floors to show the weight and thickness of the structure.”

The Dylan House

For over twenty years, the Vitra Design Museum’s Miniatures Collection has been creating mini replicas of milestones in furniture design, so it is only appropriate that we kick off our itty bitty interiors with the most iconic piece of furniture of all time: the Eames Lounge Chair and Ottoman in 1:6 scale. Yours for just $630, a fraction of the grown up cost.

The Zig Zag Stoel

Also from the Vitra Design Museum, the Zig zag stoel by Gerrit T. Rietveld. We’ll let the museum explain: “Rietveld takes up Mart Stam’s idea for a cantilevered chair (1926) and makes formal references to the Sitzgeiststuhl of the brothers Heinz and Bodo Rasch (1927).” Admired as a synthesis of form, function and construction, the Zig zag stoel is a mini-must for the serious collector.

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What happens when one style meets another? Is it catastrophe waiting to happen or is there hope for harmony?

That’s why we created Style Clash. Some design styles are more flexible; others force us to stretch outside our comfort zone. Each week we will offer tips for mixing competing styles successfully.

What do we mean by “successful”, you ask? If nothing seems strange, jarring or just plain ugly, then I’m all for it regardless of time period, colorway or material. I call it a successful Style Clash.

For our second installment in the Series we will meet Mid-Century Modern with Gothic and see where we land.

If you watch the TV series ‘Mad Men’ then you recognize Don Draper reading the newspaper in his handsome and functional Mid-Century Modern style office (top image). The decor is simple, straight-forward and 1950s to a tee.

Very few accessories and lots of glass and natural materials are key to this design style. Notice the stone flooring and wall, as well as the wood mantle and ceiling beam (image above). The furniture is lean and compact, made of wood or metal with sturdy, svelte legs; upholstery is anything but ornate (image below).

Some surmise that Mid-Century leans toward minimal, but shag rugs and pops of red-orange, bright yellow and olive green hardly say serene or plain.

In comparison, Gothic Style (image above and below) falls from a far more plush and passionate planet. It is dark and dramatic. Ornate decoration, deep, rich colors, dark woods and opulent fabrics create a mood unfit for the shy or timid. A glamorous chandelier falling from the center of a Gothic room is practically a requirement.

Combining these opposing styles may be impossible to imagine, but that’s why we are here. Style Clash turns the unimagined into a design marriage made in heaven.

The clever mixing of Mid-Century and Gothic (image above, images below) results in refined, edgy and come-in-and-stay-a-while rooms. The dark walls and richly textured velvet upholstery say Gothic to the core, while svelte wood furniture and metal legged modern chairs are born straight from Mid-Century.

The fireplace becomes sleek in a marble finish; the chandelier remains a major focus in each room, but less ornate and glam. If I had to define the style, I’d call it dark and dramatic with refined finesse.

Meet me here next week as we continue to cruise the spectrum of interior design styles, two at a time. Ciao for now!

Images: The Mid-Century Modernist, Daily Mail UK, Gramercy Park Hotel, Graham Atkins-Hughes

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The word sounds so, shall we say, cheap and chintzy? It doesn’t roll off your tongue and linger on your lips like Chateau Marmont or Fontainbleau. In fact, when I first heard the word prefab back in 2000, trailer park and double-wide sprang to mind.

But then I laid my eyes on the Eames House (image above), and it was love at first sight.

Although the Eames House isn’t pure prefab (many of its parts are), it was born of the Case Study Program (1945-1962) that challenged architects of the day to design efficient, low-cost housing. In fact, the program announcement reads like a modern prefab proposal might:

…each house must be capable of duplication and in no sense be an individual ‘performance’… It is important that the best material available be used in the best possible way in order to arrive at a “˜good’ solution of each problem, which in the overall program will be general enough to be of practical assistance to the average American in search of a home in which he can afford to live.

Prefab is far from a 20th century concept though, in fact prefabricated construction dates back to the 17th century. (To learn more about the history of prefabricated home building, read ‘Prefab’ by Allison Arieff & Bryan Burkhart. Great book!). And it’s true that these buildings haven’t always been becoming, not by a long shot. Trailer park, track homes, cookie cutter, the list goes on.

But I’m here to steer you straight. And since I’ve recently written about the death of the ugly, ostentatious and utterly offensive McMansion, I decided to focus on this pleasing alternative. Something smaller, sensible, adaptable yet fully capable of being stylish. (Just like the itHouse that Leigha wrote about.)

No, prefab is not for everyone. But no matter your personal design preference, prefab has so many merits and environmental and social checks in the positive column, it’s past the time to start paying attention.

So even if you think modern and minimal, grim, boring and cold, the following options should sway your style-buds toward prefab. I promise.

LivingHomes – RK1

The first LivingHomes prefab, RK1 (image above), was designed by architect Ray Kappe and was the first home in the U.S. to achieve the LEED^® Platinum rating in August 2006. Since then, they’ve added additional models and of course custom options galore. I had the opportunity to tour the RK1 back in 2006 and would have moved in, right then and there.

(If you live in the Newport Beach area, go see the newest LivingHome, the KTLH 1.5 designed by KieranTimberlake, on October 9 and 10. Find more information here.)

Office of Mobile Design – Santa Monica Prefab1

Jennifer Siegal is the design principal of Office of Mobile Design (OMD). Her Santa Monica Prefab1 (image above) is a 2,330 square foot, two-story, “16 ft. wide, four-module house…carefully fitted into its 25 ft. by 100 ft. narrow lot.” But it’s anything but boring or cramped. Check out her other homes, as well as her latest venture, the Desert Hot Springs Development Take Homeâ„¢.

Rocio Romero – LV Home

Available in a number of sizes and styles, the LV Series launched with the LV Home (image above), the simplest and smallest version at 1,150 sq ft and starting at $36,870. All of the modules are the same width (25′-1″) but vary in length so they fit together in any number of configurations. Rocio Romero makes it easy for the inexperienced, by offering a Getting Started tool that maps out the modular building process step by step.

Marmol Radziner Prefab – The Desert House

The Desert House (image above) was created for principal Leo Marmol, and his wife Alisa Becket. Completed in Spring 2005, it’s the prototype for Marmol Radziner Prefab. I wish I could post all the pictures here, but you’ll just have to peruse on your own. Then tell me, what’s not to love?

Marmol Radziner Prefab also offers a series of pre-configured products – Skyline, Rincon and Locomo (image above) – that range in price from $200-400 per square foot. The custom option, for those with specific architectural plans and a bigger budget, starts at $400 per sq ft and increases from there.

mkDesigns – Glidehouseâ„¢

The first of Michelle Kaufmann’s prefab designs was born in 2002 out of her and her husband’s frustration at the lack of sustainable housing options in the San Francisco Bay area. Glidehouseâ„¢ (image above) is named for the sliding glass and wooden doors throughout that create an open, indoor-outdoor living environment. The house’s list of sustainable features is impressive but not surprising considering all mkDesign homes are built based on five eco principles.

Alchemy Architects – weeHouse

The weeHouse (image above) is yet another factory-built dwelling that arrives on location ready to live in. It’s available in four sizes (Studio, Pair, Tall, Four Square) and a plethora of available materials, options, accessories and finishes. Not my favorite of the group, but definitely worth its weight in “better, cheaper, faster, easier, smarter, greener, cooler, customizable.”

I hope you’re as inspired as I am by these architects who push the envelope and strive for evolution and advancements in the art of sustainable living.

But tell me this, how does one choose which prefab to purchase when the options are so endless?

(Images and resources: prefabcosm, NYTimes, Dwell on Design, Arts & Architecture, fabprefab.)

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The walls of this mid-century modern muse contain handfuls of obsessive compulsive delights. Perpendicular angles. Gleaming surfaces. Right-angled wonders. Unspoiled purity. This space makes all my compulsions ease with modern allure. The natural materials and palette of this home blend seamlessly with the mountains they are nestled in. The scenic background of Salt Lake City, Utah serves as a silver platter for this heap of deliciousness.

A combination of natural light and natural materials makes this space a natural beauty. I have a sudden and intense crush on the mixture of deep, rich wood tones embodied in this property.

This photography was captured through the talented lens of Tyler Gourley. Satisfy your yearnings for mid-century swoons with seventy-six images of this dreamy abode. If you have ever doubted the ugly duckling ideology, get inspired with a glimpse of this home’s past. I cannot stop obsessing about this space and its stunning transformation.

(This lovely dose of perfection was spotted on Black Eiffel.)

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The new season of Mad Men has us jonesing for graphic prints, mid-century furniture, and other Sixties-inspired styles. Numerous designers are riffing on that theme, creating pieces that exude a Mad-Men-meets-modern-day vibe. Here’s how we’d style a Mad Men-inspired living room.

1. Rennie Sofa from Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams (price not listed, pictured above)
So sleek, so sexy, so versatile. We love the grid-tufted back and the hardwood frame. We can totally picture one of Don Draper’s secretaries perched demurely on this couch, but it also feels modern enough for today’s urban loft.

2. Fresca Area Rug from inmod.com (starts at $89)
As Mad Men enters the mid-Sixties, we’re seeing more bold graphic prints and fewer staid, conservative pieces. This hand-tufted wool rug is the perfect expression of that more aesthetic. Plus, its colors complement the couch.

3. Ace Trading-midea Fans FT30-U2B Table Retro Fan in Chrome from Amazon ($39.69)
Although residential AC units became increasingly common in the 1950s, offices and homes still used table fans for a more direct breeze. This fan lends a certain retro chic to your space and  lets you stay cool sans AC.

4. Brave Space – Stagger Server from Bravespace ($2,540-2,640)
Modular, asymmetrical cabinets exude modernity. We love how you can customize this piece with closed storage where you need it. The organic herbal oil finish adds an intriguing texture.

5. Inhabit Estrella Plinko Pillow in Cornflower from AllModern.com ($60-68)
A delightful graphic print on recycled polyester gives this pillow its groovy style. The colors feel modern, but not too feminine.

What do you think? Which piece(s) jumps out at you?

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