Tag Archives: Art Deco

Getting a Handle on Things: Choosing Door Hardware For My 1930s Home.

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When it came to choosing interior door handles for my home, the decision for the doors on the upper floor – bedrooms and bathroom – was easy. The original door knobs from the mid-1930s were still in place and functioning. Some were covered in layers of paint which occupants of the house had applied during those intervening years while my family lived elsewhere but I felt confident they could be restored to reveal the dark brown Bakelite beneath.

Keeping It Authentic

The ground floor rooms required further research. One of my aims with the renovation was to retain original features. I wondered if it might be possible to find a match for the existing, original knobs and achieve uniformity throughout the house. I began an internet search for companies offering replica Bakelite door knobs and handles. I wasn’t disappointed. There were several UK companies selling what seemed to be excellent replica handles, backplates and knobs in dark Bakelite material.

Further Options to Consider

I noticed that if I typed something along the lines of “1930s door handles” into an internet search platform, the results included a second type of product: metal door handles and backplates with Art Deco styling.

At that point, I started to think back to my childhood years spent in that home. By the time we moved into the house in the 1960s, the Bakelite knobs had all gone from the ground floor rooms. Contemporary metal handles had been applied instead. So if I were to introduce new metal door handles into this part of the house, it would not be at the expense of any original features.

Additionally, I started to think more about the practicality of the handles. One day when moving from the kitchen to the sitting room with a cup of tea in one hand and a clutch of papers in the other, I used an elbow to push down on the door’s existing handle to open it. The functional capabilities of a handle were not lost on me.

Still, I felt a little resistant to introducing overtly Art Deco features into this house. This was not an Art Deco building. Rather, it belonged to that class of English thirties suburban ‘semis’ which display architectural components from times past. I remembered, though, that even the most ardent builders of pseudo-historical houses in the 1930s seemed unable to resist including an Art Deco motif here and there. Our own house sported the original wrought-iron garden gates when we moved in and they featured one of the most recurring motifs in Art Deco craftsmanship: the sunburst.

So, the first step towards the decision was made. I would opt for the practicality of metal handles on backplates and go for an Art Deco style which would be in keeping with the era of the property. The next step was to trawl through the wide range of designs meeting that description. There was a great deal of choice.

Finally, the design which caught my eye was the Jedo Deco Suite Lever on Plate designed and produced by Frelan Hardware in England. When my joiner was fitting the hardware to my doors he was impressed with the quality. In my opinion, they are not only beautiful to look at but comfortable to hold and use. I chose the polished chrome version – which seemed most in keeping with the Art Deco theme – and they are extremely easy to keep fingerprint-free and shiny with a light wipe using a dry, soft cloth.

Several UK online retailers stock this line. I purchased mine from Choice Handles, an ironmongery business based in Wales.

Remarkably, these handles are currently retailing for £14.50 per set (the handles are sold in pairs) at the time of writing. I am delighted with my “find” and with my overall decision on these handles and also for the surprisingly low price for this quality.

Details

Frelan Hardware

Website: https://www.frelanhardware.co.uk/

Choice Handles

Website: https://www.choicehandles.co.uk/

Colour My World

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There was a final task to complete before my John Lewis Home Design Stylist could formulate a plan: to choose colours for my home.

Colour schemes for my previous homes over the years had usually reflected the era of their construction and their location. Neutral shades brightened with colourful accessories were applied to my 21st-century new-build apartment. Stark white walls adorned with a multitude of paintings featured in my 1920s apartment when living in Scandinavia. Had the renovation of my South London Victorian cottage ever been completed, it would have been decorated with a flourish of rich reds, greens and blues. The question of how to apply colour to a traditional English thirties house in an authentic way was a new field of research for me.

I typed “nineteen-thirties colour palettes” into several internet search engines and got a range of results. Despite the variation amongst the responses, I found after sifting through them that they largely agreed on the inclusion of dusky pastel shades and neutral tones. There was also a recurring emphasis on greens and blue-greens, muted pinks and mauves, yellows, orange and reds. I found that range interesting and yet conflicting. I wondered how it had come about.

During that decade, as I’d been learning, there was more than one style co-existing. In Britain, the desire for a healthy manner of living featuring the outdoors and nature led to an emphatic use of green. At the same time, the style which came to be later known as ‘Art Deco’ was still flourishing. Its diverse mix of influences including the Ballets Russes, archaeological discoveries of Egyptian treasures and interest in Japanese art and design – Japonism – led to vibrant reds, yellows, greens and blues and black coming to the fore.

In reality, I had a wide range of colours to work with. To narrow down what might suit my own house, I started to ponder memories of the colours in that childhood home.

I remembered green featuring throughout the house and especially so with the exterior woodwork. I had watched my father blow-torch and scrape away layers of paint from wooden window frames to reveal several shades of green. Then I saw the woodwork being re-painted partly in white and partly with a green of his personal choice.

My mother’s response to all of this was to mutter the phrase – or sometimes to sing it – “forty shades of green”. (That owed more to the Irish singer Val Doonican than it did to Johnny Cash!)

So green was the first colour to go on my list. I’d been encouraged by my Home Stylist to find images – whether from retail websites or from artworks – to illustrate colours which appealed to me. One day, just as I was taking a short-cut through the furniture department in Harrods in London (yes, really, but it’s too long a story to explain!) my eyes fell upon a beautiful marble-topped dining table. It was surrounded by chairs upholstered in the richest dark green velvet. I knew instantly that this would become my theme. The furniture was made from cherry wood stained a rich, red-brown colour. It seemed to perfectly capture the richness and warmth I wanted my home to possess.

The furniture I was looking at had been designed and produced by the French company Roche Bobois. The design range on display was named Eden Rock. I was given a brochure by a member of the sales team and that booklet became the mainstay of my home design inspiration.

Roche Bobois’ furniture range “Eden Rock” as depicted in their “Creations” Autumn -Winter 2019 brochure

I had started the process of better understanding the factors influencing colour palettes of the nineteen thirties. As a result, I felt better prepared to choose colours for my own home.

I still had more specific ideas and requirements for certain rooms, but at least I had a starting point. The image in that little brochure would serve as the foundation for planning my main living areas.

The design process was really getting underway!

A.P. 9 September 2024

Photo Ownership:

Window: Privately owned photograph.

I

Time to Choose

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The day of my appointment was looming.  I had made a booking with a Home Stylist from John Lewis’ Home Design Service and I had work to do.  I was going to have to convey to my stylist what I saw in my imagination and the look I was aiming to achieve.   

I wasn’t knowledgeable on the subject of interior design nor familiar with the specific vocabulary needed to articulate how I wanted my home to look.  While these deficiencies did not pose an obstacle to using the design service – I was simply invited to send any photographs or images to provide clues about my preferences – I did notice that a desire to learn more about the subject was being awakened.  I wanted to know more about the history and development of design movements. 

The internet can be a wonderful resource for research and I began reading a series of online articles – and blogs, of course!  I searched for books on these themes and found some very helpful, inexpensive books and set about ordering them.  I realised that my understanding of “Art Deco”, “English Country House Style” and the “Arts and Crafts” movement was a little foggy to say the least.  

To illustrate, when I had first started to think about the style I would choose for my home I thought the obvious choice would be Art Deco.  I’d grown increasingly drawn to elements of this design style over recent years and, given that this movement was at its peak in the nineteen twenties and thirties, it would be perfectly in keeping with the style of my property wouldn’t it?  Well, no, not necessarily.

Although my house had been built in the middle nineteen thirties, very few of its features could be associated with Art Deco style.  Rather, the property possessed the features of a very specific type of house built in England in the 1930s – the suburban semi-detached.  The mock-Tudor elements, the red brick construction, the harking back to design styles from previous eras were, if anything, more in tune with the Arts and Crafts movement of the late nineteenth century.   I learnt an important fact – that more than one style of art, design and architecture can exist in one time period.   

Two books in particular were very helpful in identifying the differences between what is now termed “Art Deco” architecture and the typical English suburban housing style of the nineteens thirties.  Both written by Trevor Yorke, the books “The 1930s House Explained” and “Art Deco House Styles” may be small in size but they are packed with information and illustrations identifying the characteristics of these two design styles.

In forthcoming posts, I’ll review the books and highlight points which have proved, in my own case, to be helpful.

( For further information about these books, visit: http://www.countrysidebooks.co.uk )

By Design

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It was becoming clear that I’d need assistance to achieve my goal of blending several design themes and influences.  

On the other hand the thought that “it’s my home, I can decorate it how I like” kept surfacing.   Besides, how much would an interior design consultation cost?  Surely I’d do better to use those funds for items of furnishing?  Furthermore, for such a modest property – and an owner whose desire was to live quietly – might it be perceived as a little pretentious to commission the services of a professional designer?

Then I thought back to my Victorian house renovation experience – the one which didn’t go so well – and I remembered that it had been a lack of consultation which had led to so many costly mistakes.   I realised I was mentally writing off an interior design appointment on the grounds of price when I didn’t really know what the price would be.   Even though I had no idea where to start in identifying a suitable Interior Design Consultancy, I resolved to begin doing research.

Image of John Lewis department store in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. Image shows galleried restaurant area overlooking the concourse in Eldon Square shopping centre.
John Lewis, Newcastle upon Tyne

A day or so later, I needed to refer to some information I’d scribbled in a notebook and I rummaged in a bag to find the book.  A leaflet fluttered out of the bag onto the floor.  The leaflet had been handed to me by a counter assistant on my most recent visit to John Lewis (a UK national department store) and it contained information about their Home Design Service.  

All sorts of questions – mainly negative ones – entered my mind.  Would the Home Design Service just be an exercise in “up-selling”?  Might I be subjected to persuasion to go with current trends rather than my own, somewhat idiosyncratic styling ideas?  Would any Home Design Stylist afford the time ( and have the patience ) to listen to my mish-mash of ideas and then have the experience to pull them together into a harmonious scheme? 

Just what would an Interior Design professional think when approached by a client who wanted to draw on inspiration from Art Deco, the Arts and Crafts Movement, English Country House Styling, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and shoe-horn the whole disparate bunch into one house whilst attempting to respect its 1930s heritage?

Despite my many concerns, I concluded that it wouldn’t hurt to enquire further about the service.

Would it be possible to blend such an array of styles?

Photo Credits:

Charles Rennie Mackintosh mural, Glasgow: ID 155928611 © Ross Boag | Dreamstime.com

Chrysler Building, New York: ID 10658037 © Mikhail Kusayev | Dreamstime.com

Row of English 1930s houses: ID 55049188 © Andrew Hamilton | Dreamstime.com

Claridge’s Hotel, London: ID 220739361 © Amanda Lewis | Dreamstime.com

William MorrisFabric, Maling Dish: A.P.

A Question of Style

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The fog was beginning to clear when it came to finding companies to carry out the renovation work.  Over recent years, I’d come to trust local tradespeople to repair and upgrade my apartment – gas fitters, plumbers, painters and decorators, for example.  Of course, I could turn to them to carry out work for me but what I hadn’t utilised previously was their wealth of knowledge of other locally based, skilled workers.  They knew electricians, builders and joiners they’d worked with on a wide variety of projects and they were confident in making recommendations.  The answer to the question of who would do my work was closer to home than I’d realised!

The next stage involved on-site meetings with a succession of tradespeople to find out who seemed best suited to the brief and to begin to gather rough estimates of costs.  At this point, I had tried to focus on practical tasks such as plumbing and wiring and I’d avoided becoming side-tracked with more superficial questions.  Trivialities such as the wallpaper and furniture I’d like could not possibly be considered at this stage!  Or so I thought.

While discussing possible ideas for lighting and fitted shelving, the electrician and joiner I spoke with wanted to know more about my intended decor styles.  They needed to know that any fittings they would install would be appropriate and in keeping with the intended “look” which was to be achieved.

And that was the moment it all became exciting!  I began to understand that design, decor, styling – whatever we wish to call it – was absolutely integral to the planning and execution of the renovations.  Rather than dismissing thoughts of decor, I needed to know from the outset the style I was aiming to achieve.

This led to a further dilemma.  My natural inclination seemed to favour what I would term “English Country House” styling yet my thoughts kept gravitating back to the concept that homes look best when they are decorated in a style in keeping with the era of the building.  This was a nineteen thirties house, so did that mean I’d need to replicate the interior of an English pre-war dwelling and, effectively, live in a museum? 

I’d also noted – in more recent years – how much I was being drawn to Art Deco shapes and forms and it struck me that it would not be inappropriate to include some features evocative of that style.   This was no Miami Beach Art Deco building however, this was a modest structure built with the very particular features with which suburban housing of 1930s England is associated.  Would Art Deco features look contrived, too theatrical and out of place?  

Would I be restricted by a rigid formula of what an English “thirties” home should or should not contain?  Would I be allowed to blend in a few touches harking back to my love of the English Country House style?   What about my interest in the Arts and Crafts movement – could William Morris put in an appearance anywhere?  And how could I forget Charles Rennie Mackintosh?  Those stylised roses for which Mackintosh is renowned could be squeezed in somewhere, surely?

I realised that there was no one theme which would fulfil all of the decor features I’d love to have in my home.  However, I also realised that choosing an “eclectic” design ran the risk of ending up with a confused, cluttered mess.  I wondered if it could be possible to blend interior design styles in a restrained, controlled way and to produce an harmonious and balanced result.  

The Goring Hotel, London

One sunny, early Spring day, I was enjoying a pre-lunch drink in the lounge of The Goring Hotel in London.  (Stay with me, this is actually relevant!)  For me, this hotel demonstrates English Country House Style (with a very light touch of eccentricity). Relaxing in the lounge, I took in the features around me and as my gaze reached ceiling level I felt a distinct change in atmosphere.  As I stared at the golden-bronze ceiling with its warm glow and muted splendour,  it seemed I was no longer sitting in a grand country home. I’d been transported to Paris at the end of the nineteenth century and I might well have had Toulouse Lautrec sitting next to me!  Whether this was the intended effect of the decor, I can’t say, but that was most definitely my response to it.  I was looking at a seamless blending of styles – of English classic styling set next to a feature which would have looked at ease in a fin-de-siècle Parisian café. 

The Goring Hotel Lobby

So it can be done!  It is possible to mix styles and for the end result to look harmonious and really rather beautiful.  It struck me however, that you’d really have to know what you were doing to pull off such an interior design “mash-up” and get it right.  Unsure I had the ability to achieve such an objective, another question was raised:  who will help me to blend the styling themes I love yet achieve an harmonious integration?

A.P.

31 May 2021

Photo Credits:

The Goring Hotel Exterior: Photo 58984840 © Slawek Kozakiewicz | Dreamstime.com

The Goring Hotel Lift Lobby: A.P.