• Arroyo’s Edge: Greene & Greene interiors 2012

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    a tour of six Greene and Greene-designed properties in Pasadena’s historic Park Place neighborhood
     
    This coming Earth Day, architecture buffs are in for a Greene and Greene (and green) treat. On Sunday, April 22, 2012, The Gamble House will present Arroyo’s Edge: Greene and Greene Interiors 2012, a rare opportunity to visit six privately-owned properties designed by Charles and Henry Greene between 1902 and 1915. Featuring acclaimed architectural features and design by the masters of the American Arts & Crafts movement, the five private homes and one private garden will be open for touring along Arroyo Terrace and North Grand Avenue in Pasadena, all within easy walking distance of The Gamble House.
     
    It has been twenty years since a “Greene and Greene Interiors” tour featured the interiors of houses in the historic Park Place neighborhood.  On April 22 from 12 noon to 5 p.m. (last entry 4 p.m.), this remarkably intact enclave of the Greenes’ work – once known as “Little Switzerland” for its woodsy, chalet-style structures – will once again be the focus of a tour to benefit The Gamble House, a National Historic Landmark designed by Greene and Greene in 1908 and operated by the University of Southern California School of Architecture as a public site since 1966.
     
    Thanks to the generosity of six property owners, the Arroyo’s Edge tour will feature: the Duncan-Irwin house(1906-08), the Mary Ranney house (1907), the F. W. Hawks house (1906), the Van Rossem-Neill house (1903-06), the Louise T. Halstead house (1905-15) and the James Culbertson garden (1902-14), and will give participants a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see Greene and Greene interiors that are rarely, if ever, opened to the public.
     
    tour details:
    date: Sunday April 22, 2012
    hours: noon – 5 pm (last entry at 4 pm)
    general admission: $85 per person; $50 for children under 12
    member admission: $75 per person (to join Friends of The Gamble House visit gamblehouse.org or call 626.783.3334 x16)
    Off-street parking is available to ticket holders. We regret that these private homes and gardens are not wheelchair accessible. Visitors should plan to wear sturdy walking shoes.
     
    proceeds benefit The Gamble House, a National Historic Landmark in Pasadena, CA
     
    about The Gamble House: Built in 1908, the Gamble House is the most complete and best-preserved example of the work of renowned Pasadena architects Charles and Henry Greene. The Gamble House is an internationally recognized National Historic Landmark in the style of the American Arts and Crafts movement. Owned by the City of Pasadena, the Gamble House is operated by the University of Southern California School of Architecture.
     
    The Gamble House is open for public, docent-led, one-hour tours Thursday – Sunday, noon – 3 pm, closed on national holidays. For more information, visit gamblehouse.org.

    photograph: Exterior detail from the Duncan-Irwin house (which is part of this tour). Photograph by Alexander Vertikoff.

  • A New Age for Wooden Toys, pt 1

    I grew up in Berkeley, California in the 1970s. You know what that means: whole wheat birthday cakes made with organic flour, unfiltered fruit juice, brown rice, hand-knit sweaters … and wooden toys.

    While definitely not a hippie myself, I do have a soft spot for pretty wooden toys, and try to buy my child things that are made by actual human hands with natural materials. Here are a few especially nice items I've seen, all of which are ostensibly made for kids, but which would be appreciated by any adult with taste and an interest in the hand-made.

    I loved these as a kid. They're incredibly cheap – $6 for a pack of 50 – but you can build the most incredible, intricate sculptures out of them, from model skyscrapers to full-on Buckyballs:

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    This pretty mushroom puzzle would be best accompanied by a lesson to teach kids how to spore-print, so that they'll never accidentally eat anything that might hurt them:

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    These "pet monster" blocks are unfortunately sold out (on Etsy, a treasure-trove of handmade toys):

     

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    Etsy seller Deepoca has these four vintage pieces of wooden fruit – a banana, pear, apple and starfruit – for only $12 for the set:

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    Ulf Hanses designed this 5.25-inch-long Playsam Streamliner wooden car; FitzSu Los Angeles carries them for $46.

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    Simus the wooden rhinocerous, designed by David Weeks in the style of the great Danish designer Kay Bojesen, is just one of several articulated wooden animals carried by the same company:

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    Fine Wooden Toys carries this very cool stacking/nesting "furniture house," which can also be a balancing toy, a tunnel-builder, or any one of a dozen other open-ended play items:

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    The same company sells this cool and colorful German-made magnetic wooden Indian Square puzzle:

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    They also have this wonderful fully-furnished ready-to-paint (or wallpaper) dollhouse for $90. I bought one for my daughter before she was born and she gets an enormous amount of use out of it:

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    Eric Carle was one of my favorite authors as a child and should be well-known to your kids, too; I was happy to discover that the Eric Carle Museum has a number of well-made toys based on his stories, including this very pretty (and very hungry) 12" long caterpillar pull-toy:

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    Etsy maker/seller Imaginationkids has a number of pretty, sturdy, and brightly-colored stacking, rolling and other sorts of toys (all of which function just as well as desk sculpture for grownups) at extremely fair prices:

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    Ikea's very cool Lillabo vehicles are $10 for a pack of three, and are only available in some of their stores. And while I always prefer to buy from makers themselves, Ikea does carry a number of really sturdy wooden toys.

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    Chicago's Agent Gallery has the 28" tall Mr. Wood, below, currently on sale for an undisclosed sum (if you have to ask, etc.):

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    Blackwagon is a "modern boutique for babies and kids," and carries lots of neat wooden toys, like this cool spinning top:

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    These pretty Scots-made wooden rattles are £30 from Papa Stour:

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    Wolfgang Sirch's Max Pushcar is one of several designs made by the Sirch family, who have been designing and making wooden objects for more than 300 years in their native Germany:

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    You may think the timing of this piece is a bit off – after all, the traditional holiday gift-giving season just ended with 2010. However, kids appreciate beautiful, educational, well-made gifts any time of year, and maybe you'll get some good ideas from the items I've shown above.

  • brown shingle, alpenhaus style

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    This 398-square-meter (approximate 4000 sq ft) German home combines some of the best aspects of the traditional German mountain farmhouse and the Western Stick brown shingle design – so popular in the United States – with modern materials and engineering. Germany’s LP Architektur built it in six months and finished primary construction in 2008.

  • A New Focus for Hewn & Hammered

    I want to start out by apologizing for the infrequent posts here in the last six months. Family responsibilities have kept me (happily!) very busy.

    Thus, in an attempt to increase the amount of interesting, useful, readable content here, I've decided to change the focus of the site somewhat. While we will still focus on architectural and design issues, we'll expand a little bit – we'll still include content related to old homes & the modern and historical Arts & Crafts Movements, but I'll also be posting regular articles on more contemporary, non-A&C work.

    Modern furniture, architecture and design objects – still, always, with an emphasis on the wood, the hand-made, the product of skilled craft – will become a big part of this site. I know some of you are not nearly as interested in this sort of thing, but I hope this will bring a large number of new readers here. I promise to keep posting things that fans of Arts & Crafts will appreciate, though!

  • ask an expert: caring for hardwood floors

    The Cleveland Plain Dealer‘s always-useful Ask an Expert column dealt this past week with something we all need to be concerned about but often overlook: caring for our hardwood floors.

    Q: I have a beautiful 1925 Craftsman bungalow. The house is blessed with wood floors. I have noticed a black spot near the doorway to the kitchen (a heavy-traffic area) and also in the corner of the family room (a not-so-heavy-traffic area). What are my options in dealing with theses spots? And, more importantly, where do they come from so I can stop them from coming back? There are no leaks anywhere near the spots, and the floor is always dry (except when I mop). Do you have any suggestions on types of cleaners I can use to keep the floors looking shiny and new? I’ve been using Murphy’s Oil Soap. – D.W., Bedford

    A: From Roger Somogyi of Lamb Floor Fashion Center (30840 Lake Shore Blvd., Willowick, 440-943-6722):

    As you know, hardwood floors are natural, beautiful and timeless. Caring and consistent proper cleaning and maintenance will ensure that they remain that way.

    As for the black spots, I would have to assume that it is some type of moisture-related problem, possibly pet urine or mold. With your home being a 1925 vintage, it is likely that whatever has caused the black spots has penetrated the surface, and a plank replacement is the best way to permanently solve the problem. The wood planks that show the spots can be removed, new, unfinished planks can be installed, and the new planks can be custom stained to match the color and finish of your existing floor. A reputable wood repair and refinishing company should be able to help.

    Cleaning techniques vary depending on the type of finish that is on the uppermost layer of the floor, which is called the wear layer. Knowing the type of finish is important to properly clean a wood floor.

    read the entire column with information on caring for a variety of finishes

  • Stickley on Craigslist: December 11, 2007

    This is so much easier now that I can collect these listings automatically! As usual, I make no guarantees as to the authenticity of any of these items – be careful (and note that some items described as "Stickley era" or "Stickley style" do get through the filter – I try to remove them by hand but once in awhile leave the item in if I think it’s nice enough or interesting):

  • fine furniture on Etsy.com

    Speaking of buying handmade gifts this holiday season, I took a quick look at Etsy.com, a site which lets all sorts of craftspeople market their wares easily, and found that plenty of talented woodworkers are selling some really nice furniture:

  • book review: Craftsman Furniture Projects

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    Craftsman Furniture Projects: Timeless Designs & Trusted Techniques From Woodworking’s Top Experts

    My colleague Derek Martin, an experienced and very talented woodworker, recently offered to review a book I received from the kind folks at Woodworkers’ Journal:

    Thank you for the opportunity to read and give my brief review of Craftsman Furniture Projects.

    I will start out by saying that I not only enjoyed the easy reading, but I also found myself distracted by the illustrations as I thumbed my way through the book. The book is loaded with diagrams, templates and pictures. Many more visual displays are also included to show exactly what is being done which can be especially useful if it’s your first time trying a particular procedure. Finished products are also displayed to show you what you are working towards at all times. So the use of illustration in this book along with descriptive detail made it an A+ for me.

    One of my favorite items was the use of old woodworking tools and the brief explanation of what their purpose was on the project. Some were tools that can still be very useful today such as the wood marking gauge used to drawl more precise lines while performing the layout of a rabbet joint on a piece of stock. Simple tools like this can be found, usually when you’re not looking for them, at garage sales and flea markets and I have developed a habit of collecting and using such items rather than their newer and cheaper counterparts.

    Throughout the book you will find sections called Quick-Tips and Technical Drawings. These brief paragraphs are hints and tips that outline safety, accuracy and workarounds for each project.

    This issue includes nearly twenty beautiful furniture pieces that can be constructed in any decently outfitted woodshop. I would recommend this book to any beginner who wants to try their hand at building sturdy and eye-catching furniture or any master craftsman who thinks he’s seen it all.