Thursday, February 11, 2010

Mid-Century Retro Doors and Tour
And, Gallery of Garages

This is where it started. I love this house. The square window on the door. The repeating squares below it. The squares next to the windows. How fun.

Darling.
And, it got me thinking.
Couldn't you make your own repeating squares on a door with maybe a picture frame?
(Or, molding if you have a handy miter saw - which I don't.)
You could start with this...


One lonely window - in this case on its side, could be replicated with frames below it painted with a contrasting color. Something like this.


I love the contrasting cream with burgundy outline.
(Sorry for the dark pics - I was burning daylight.)

Let's flip it!
Burgundy with a cream outline!

How about this one?
TRIANGLES!


Okay, I'm swooning.
Now, one of the reasons I was going to blog this is not only because I thought perhaps you could make your own retro style door...but also garage door.

So, I drove around, and around...trying to find the garage that I *know* I've seen with raised molding rectangles like the doors - but couldn't find it.

Instead, I found a heck of a lot of cool vintage garage doors! Here's a blend of the diamond front door detail with a funky garage detail.


Can you see the funky swirlies?

Come on a vintage garage tour with me?
How about some chevrons?

Or, a criss-crossy space-age design?


Anyone for a satellite on your garage?
Or, maybe it's an alien spaceship?

Now we get into the "fine detail work."
Looking at the green one again, we have a curly-Q design.
Or, swirly, or whatever.

And, here's a triangle version of the curly-Q.


Let's flip that one, too.
Here's a dark-on-light version.

How about a cute little bow-tie or keyhole design?
(With a decidedly 1960s door.)

Here's a picture in picture design.


Lastly, there's a little "village in a village" where many 60's apartments - now condos - face each other to form a little retro complex. On the end of two of the buildings are stone vignettes.

(I'm really not sure what to call a vintage 60's stone portrait?
Anyone know? Please comment below if you do!)

**Thank you to Pam Kueber of Retro Renovation who said she thought the word I was looking for is "relief."

We are losing daylight, but here's a backside of one of the complex buildings.

Here's the best I could get of the center portion - where the buildings face each other.

And, here's one of the two stone reliefs.
This one portrays Robin Hood.
(The other one is worn from weather. But, the Robin Hood is lovely.)
And, how about that amazing wall of layered stone?!


Thanks for coming on our little vintage front door and garage tour.
I hope some of these have inspired you.

What do you think?
Could you make your own "DIY Vintage Door" using molding or a picture frame?

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2 comments:

Lisa@The Cutting Edge of Ordinary said...

Dana did you take all those pics?? Lord girl you are ambitious if you did. Great post.

Dana @ Cooking At Cafe D said...

Yeah, Lisa, those pics are all fron last night. (And, boy, once the sun started setting...the pics gat bad. My cell camera does wonderfully in light, but it's horrible in low light.)

I kept driving around hoping to see this one garage door that I see ALL THE TIME...and couldn't for the life of me find last night! LOL!

Then I figured, well, these are kinda cool. Maybe someone will get a kick outta them :)

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I love to hear your thoughts!
--Dana

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