MOVarazzi

Sunday, February 19, 2012

677. Check Out Our Old House in California!

This is our old house in California.  We sold it when we moved across country to Crazy Town almost eight years ago. 

our house in Los Angeles
Here is some info about the house: 
  • It was a Craftsman style house built in 1913.
  • It was painted a weird teal green when we bought it, so we changed it to navy (click HERE for that blog post).  This navy was a Ralph Lauren color (cannot remember the name--sorry!) and it looked black on the chip.  
  • We put in that new walkway, and also new grass.  
  • There had been some sort of wall enclosure thing on the left side of the porch, which we removed.
  • I handpainted the house number up there while standing on a very shaky ladder.  Because I am so smart like that.  (Fact:  #1 household injury cause is falling off of ladders.  Fact:  I just made that up.) 
  • That little cross design you see painted on the columns was there in the bricks, but had been painted over.  We chose to highlight it.  
  • I took this photo in such a way as to block the front door because it was really ugly and we never had enough money to replace it and it was a perfectly good door, just ugly, so hard to justify buying a new one.  
Here is a picture of our living room/ dining room in that house:


such a Virgo living room; by the way, had to stand on chair to take this photo 
We made a lot of changes in here:
  • We stained the floors dark.  
  • We painted the walls a very soft lavender with white trim.
  • The biggest transformation was that we ADDED those divider cabinet/ bookcases you see.  We are pretty sure something similar was in the house originally, but when we bought it, they were not there.  We hired a carpenter to build them. 
  • Next, I took a book of 1920's design pictures to a stained glass place and the lady duplicated the lovely glass design.  New, but made to look old!  That was my favorite part.  I really loved it when people would say, "Oh, the original built-in's!"  That was very gratifying.  I always felt like the house was giving me a big hug for putting those back in. 
All right, here is another favorite thing from that house.  Our blue stove in the kitchen:

pretty stove
When we sold the house, the new owners wrote that stove into the contract. 
  • 1952 O'Keefe & Merritt stove
  • Came with the house when we bought it
  • Was white, we had it re-enameled cobalt blue at Antique Stove Heaven
  • They also completely re-built it and refurbished it
  • Best stove we ever owned
  • We would like to get a red one for our current home at some point
Here is a pic of our back deck at that house: 
    I was in a lavender phase
The nice thing about that house was that we had a lemon tree.  It produced enough lemons to probably sell at a Farmer's Market.  Mostly we made lemon bread or lemon pancakes or lemonade.

Okay, are you bored yet?  This is Tall's cute little baby room.

was this clean once, for this photo when we were selling house
 Last photo for today:

Tall, age 7 months
 Hope you liked the tour!

MOV

27 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. thanks hilary! we sooooooo miss that stove!

      Delete
  2. My dream house! We had a house like that when I was younger, but you did an amazing job with this house...love, love the exterior color! You must miss it...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thanks! but I know you lie, because you said on your blog that your dream house is made of CHOCOLATE. See, I read your blog. Hey, everyone, go read Tracie's blog, right now! it is very cool.

      and yes, I do miss the house (esp. I miss how good it looked on Photo Day-- ha!).

      Delete
  3. I love this house, always have had a soft spot for the Craftsman. I want the stove!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you S+L+T (that is easier than writing it all out). :)

      Delete
  4. Wonderful! And putting the dividers back in was genius!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I want more of this shit. This was good! Made me feel happy seeing it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. yay! thanks Mollie! will try to more of this for future posts..........

      Delete
  6. So you are a creative writer AND decorator?! I have to go eat some chocolate now...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. *blushing*

      (and make sure it is Free Trade fair labor chocolate, or Tracie at Crack You Whip will be all over you!)

      Delete
  7. First of all, you have some awesome framed posters.

    That aside, you should really be an interior decorator specializing in remodelings/rehabs. I used to volunteer at the Preservation Society in Asheville just for all the free tours of Arts & Crafts homes in the area. Many of them were quite amazing and looked like their owners had sunk hundreds of thousands of dollars into them, but I never, ever saw anything nearly as awesome as 1) that stove, and 2) those stained glass built-ins. You have a good eye. Print some business cards and start telling people which design decisions to make! You can totally do it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. hey Miss Haley,

      You are going to laugh, because I do have a couple nice posters, but the 2 that are in Tall's baby room are (*gasp*) copies of famous posters, and they were of course purchased at target!!!

      thank you so much for your vote of confidence! You totally made my day. :)

      xxo
      MOV

      Delete
  8. I love build ins of all kinds, but those are especially gorgeous! And that stove is incredible. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go find an uncluttered corner of industrial/rental carpeting so I can rock myself.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you! (and if you are going to do any rocking, may I respectfully recommend a birdseye maple arts and crafts rocker, just sayin')

      Delete
  9. Lovely house and you did a great job on it.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Now you've done it. I cannot begin to tell you how obsessed I am with Craftsman style, houses, etc. Just yesterday I was looking at a book all about Mackintosh -- and then you show up here with those amazing built-ins with the leaded glass! *sigh* Let's not even talk about the sweet baby photo. Thanks for sharing all these great photos!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ah, couse, my number one fan. Contact me via email at
      1julieharrison@gmail.com
      with your info and I will send you some of my craftsman books that I have accumulated. You live in England, right?

      xxo
      MOV

      Delete
  11. I LOVED this post, and I really wished you lived closer so you could help me decorate. I'm so bad at it. Such a cute house, but an even cuter baby!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. oh, that baby! why is he so mouthy now that he is 8? what is up with that? (look how sweet and cute while sleeping and not knowing how to talk yet!)

      and thank you for your nice words on the decor front.

      Delete
  12. What a lovely house, and you obviously have a great deal of talent for interior design!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you! that means a lot! :) thanks for reading, always happy when you comment, Jo.

      Delete
  13. Ok, last time....
    AWWWWW! Tall was (i'm assuming still is) beautiful! bless his little socks.

    The hand painted door number is genius! I would steal that idea, but most houses in the UK are made of brick, so i think it's look pretty ugly if I did it on my house :(

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thanks, aysh! he is still a cute kid, just not as compliant (he's in a very talk-backy stage, making me wish for the diaper days when I could not understand him, but at least he was nicer-- ha!).

      glad you like the house number! not sure where I got that idea, it just seemed like that beam was calling out for it.........

      Delete
  14. Do you spose that I could get J to let me get a stove like that for our new build? I want one so so bad. He's a stick in the mud about it. :o) Was the double oven grand or what? Or was it a warmer? Green with envy!

    ReplyDelete

When you write a comment, it makes me feel like I won the lottery or at the very least like I ate an ice-cream sundae. (This has nothing to do with the fact that I did just eat an ice-cream sundae.)