• more library card catalogs & other storage – craigslist

    Filecabinets

    I know people love these things. I do too … I just don’t have anywhere to fit more furniture in my house, especially not with the step tansu that I’d like to wedge into the living room somehow. Here are several I’ve found this week on Craigslists around the country:

    west coast

    midwest

    east coast

    • petite tabletop 6-drawer card file in Ithaca NY: $50enormous, ex-built-in 19th-century dark wood
    • 72-drawer library card file near Boston MA: $1200
    • 14-drawer library card file (5×8 cards) with two missing drawers in Browns Mills NJ: $45

    south & southwest

    • tabletop 2-drawer Remington Rand oak card file in Crawfordville FL: $80
    • wood and plastic 60-drawer & 3-shelf library card file in Jacksonville FL: $650
    • two large four-drawer wooden file cabinets from Library Bureau SoleMalers, early 20th century, near Orlando FL: $335 each
    • 15-drawer, 2-shelf tabletop library card file, includes table, near San Antonio TX: $200

  • Lavello Sinks – big, beautiful, stainless – and affordable

    Stainlesssinkkitchenwide

    I’m in the process of remodeling my own kitchen, and found an enormous variety of prices for very similar items. Some sinks – European brands, mostly – were ridiculously expensive, when the exact same sink (in this case, an enormous 36" stainless steel apron-fron) was 1/2 the price or less from an American vendor. I took a closer look – the metal looked the same, it was the same weight and construction, and was probably built at the same factory by the same people!

    You really do need to shop around, and don’t let your contractor suggest an expensive item when you can find the exact same thing for a fraction of the price. I found my beautiful sink from Matt Roberts’ Lavello Sinks and really couldn’t be happier with the sink or the service. Matt is a commercial contractor and property manager who found a great source for sinks that would otherwise go for $1500; he realized that there was a huge need for affordable but good quality stainless sinks, and I’m sure that his business will thrive. His prices are far better than anything else I’ve found elsewhere, and the shipping was super-fast and very affordable. If every transaction and interaction I had to engage with over the course of this remodel was as pleasant, painless (and, again, affordable) as my interaction with Matt, it sure would make the whole process a lot easier!

    Once my kitchen is done – I’m thinking we’re about eight weeks away – I’ll post pictures of the sink installation and the finished project. Until then, if you’re looking for a pretty and modern stainless sink that works very well with an historic kitchen, check him out, and tell him I sent you!

  • a modern Craftsman kitchen

    Ih00016_plan
    Taunton publishes lots and lots of good books devoted to historic architecture in general and the Arts & Crafts movement specifically. I was happy but not surprised, then, to pick up a few back issues of The Inspired House, an (unfortunately out of print?) at a local used bookshop.

    The magazine seems to have halted publication mid-2006, but mining their online archive yielded lots of good stuff, including this article by Debra Judge Silber on a very modern yet classically attractive Craftsman kitchen remodel in a 1915 historic foursquare:

    When they found their brick foursquare in the
    mid-1980s, Ed and Kathy Friedman couldn’t believe their luck. They’d
    spent 10 years building a collection of Arts and Crafts furniture and
    decorative objects, and here was the perfect home in which to display
    it. The 1915 foursquare, with its built-in benches and bookcases, was
    as well preserved as if it had been locked in a time capsule.

    Except for the kitchen. Remodeled in the ’50s, the boxy room had plastic tiles running halfway around it and
    white metal cabinets backed awkwardly against the walls. Not just
    outdated, it was completely at odds with the purposeful beauty of the
    rest of the house.

    Visit their site for the full article. Floorplan by Martha Garstang Hill, whose illustrations and architectural drawings adorn many Taunton books.