Our Mid-Century Modern Primary Bathroom Remodel

Our primary bathroom went through the biggest visual change with a full remodel. We took everything down to the studs and corrected some hidden mistakes along the way. The main objective was to make the bathroom feel bigger and add as much storage as possible, without moving any walls.

Before

After

We started with the same wall paint as the rest of the house, so now the whole house feels like one. We also took out the broken ceiling speakers and patched up those holes.

Before

After

A frameless corner shower with a new, black shower head went a long way into opening up the space. 

We used Hudson Tangier emerald porcelain mosaic tile along two walls to give an expansive feel to what used to be a very crowded and closed-in shower space. Putting in large, white, marble-looking floor tiles brightened up the room a lot too. And adding floating shelves opened up the rest of that wall and lets in a lot more light from a nearby window. The shelves are the same as the ones in the kitchen. We tried to keep elements the same from room to room so there's a natural visual flow as you walk through the house.

We went with black fixtures in this bathroom to coordinate with the emerald tile, starting with a black Modway Render vanity, which is the same style of vanity as our hallway bathroom. Again, matching elements from other parts of the house. 

Then we finished the room with a globe-style vanity light, globe ceiling light, a recessed vanity mirror for extra storage, black Moen Genta fixtures throughout, and the same high-efficiency toilet as the hallway bathroom. As an added touch, we put in a Japanese-style toilet seat, which I highly recommend for any bathroom.

Our Mid-Century Study Update

The study didn't change all that much, we largely just matched it to the other rooms in the house, with a full mid-century interior paint job and a new Wade Logan Bahar flush mount ceiling light. We also took the doors between the primary bedroom and the study off. It's a much more natural flow between the two rooms without them.

Our Mid-Century Bedroom Updates

All of the bedrooms got the same updates, a full paint job and new ceiling fans.

We wanted all of the bedroom ceiling fans to be the same and to be an upgrade from our contractor-grade fans. We went with the Hampton Bay Nevali fan in each room. The blades are a good match to the original hardwood floors and it has a modern style that fits in with the rest of the ceiling lights in the house.

The updates did mean painting over the world map mural in our travel-themed nursery, but it's a teenager's room now, not a nursery. I also spent days removing glow-in-the-dark stars from ceiling of the guest bedroom with a hair dryer and tweezers, but it was worth it to save our mid-century ceilings.

Our Mid-Century Bathroom Remodel

One of the first posts on this site was to complain about the tile in the hallway bathroom. I hated it from day one till the moment we tore it all out. And we tore it all out when we did a full remodel of the hallway bathroom.

Before

After

Shower before

Shower after

We literally raised the roof over the shower. It had a drop ceiling for some reason, but now it's taller and brighter. 

We used the original hexagon floor tile as inspiration for the entire bathroom. We liked the original floor, but it was too dingy and chipped to keep so we replaced it with a classic black and white hexagon mosaic floor tile. We continued the pattern up the shower and in the nooks with 2" black hexagon tiles and finished out the rest of the shower with classic white subway tiles and a new sliding glass door.

I wanted to match the original cross handles on all the fixtures, but in metal. The only metal cross bath fixtures with a mid-century modern look that I could find where the Kohler Purist line.

We used the Purist line for the bath faucet, shower head, bath spout, sink faucet, and all the other fixtures.

We finished the bathroom out with a Modway Render mid-century bathroom vanity, a stainless steel  mirror, and a high-efficiency toilet. For the light, we matched the hallway to create a connection between the two rooms.

Our Mid-Century Hallway Updates

The smallest part of our house had the highest percentage of things updated. We started by swapping out the light switches. They were the only switches in the house that were the old-school standard switches and not pole rocker switches. We also swapped the location of attic light and the hallway light. Now the hall light is closer to the door, where it should be. It's something that bugged me since the day we moved in.

I wasn't going to take photos for any of these updates, but this one requires it because we used a lot of dead stock items to update the hallway.

For the light we used this mid-century sconce bought from Rejuvenation. They don't sell it anymore, but you can get the same vibe with these sconces. The original hall light looked like a sea shell and was in desperate need of an update.

We kept the original wood doors and had them repainted. They're mid-century quality and there was no reason to replace them. We did replace all of the door knobs, backplates, and latches. We had just enough of the original, and literally irreplaceable (I looked everywhere), mid-century backplates that we could put one on the front of each door.

The knobs used to be a mix of glass knobs, silver knobs, and black knobs. We swapped them all out with this vintage brass knob set, this black rosette on the back, and this latch set. It was a perfect match and now all the handles look the same.

Another thing that will go (visually) unnoticed is replacing the intake vent. We replaced all vents instead of painting them. If you still have vintage vents, I recommend updating, not painting. The airflow in our house is a lot better.

Our Mid-Century Breakfast Nook Updates

Most of the breakfast nook changes happened during our mid-century modern kitchen remodel, including new flooring to match the original hardwoods and a new mid-century door, one that looks pretty similar to this one. We had Moe Light Honeycomb lights on the ceiling, but they were too small for the room. We swapped them out with a set of Bahar Glass Flush Mount ceiling lights. The match the ceiling lights in the living room and help create a nice flow from one room to the other.

Our Mid-Century Living Room Updates

On top of the new authentic mid-century paint job, we wanted to refresh the lighting in the living room. We had the ceiling fan we installed when we moved in, and it was fine, but we wanted blades that matched our hardwood flooring better. We installed a Davrick ceiling fan, which isn't available anymore, but this ceiling fan is a pretty close match.

We also put in a new ceiling light by the front door. Again, the old one we installed was fine, but it was time for an upgrade. We went with the Bahar Glass Flush Mount ceiling light. The smallest size still allowed the door to swing open without hitting it and matched the ceiling fan look really well.

We like the Bahar Glass Flush Mount ceiling lights a lot. So much so that they became the mid-century modern ceiling lights that we installed in most other rooms. It's nice to have one look across the whole house, instead of a mishmash of lighting fixtures.

Our Mid-Century Interior Paint Colors

We repainted everywhere in our mid-century home. In the original sales listing photos, everything was a nice light gray. But they didn't do a professional job painting and the old colors were peaking through in a lot of places. Everything needed a fresh coat and it was painting all the walls that pushed us to do the other renovations.

Trying to stick to authentic mid-century interior paint colors, we decided to stay with gray for the walls, specifically Silver Cloud (30YY 63/024). 

Silver Cloud gray

It's light enough that rooms still feel big, but it has a warmth to it so the space feels cozy. Almost every wall in every room is this color now and we enjoy our whole house more because of it.

The trim was a bit tricky because we wanted to color match the original trim. We looked at a million shades of white. The one that ended up being the right color for our trim was Stone White (30YY 76/017).

Finally, our original mid-century ceiling needed a fresh coat too. We went with a standard flat white ceiling paint. It makes it look fresh and new even though the tiles have been here since the '40s. I was also able to remove the glow stars that were in one room. A hair dryer to melt the glue and a pair of tweezers to pull them off was the key to not damaging the ceiling.

Our Mid-Century Home Renovations

It's been years since I've posted, but in that time we've done some pretty big renovations and remodels to our mid-century home and I wanted to come back and check them off our to-do list. I love checking things off a list.

I'm not going to share pictures of the final product. This blog was pre-social media and frankly my picture-taking skills are not up to modern standards. All of the work looks great, but it wouldn't come across that way with me as the photographer. 

I am going to share all of the products we used because they keep with the mid-century design and look that we're trying to keep, while adding the modern conveniences. And I went on a pretty deep dive to find all of these, so you don't have to. I'm going to split these into a series of posts so you can go room by room if you're in the middle of a mid-century renovation yourself.

The State of Mid-Century Blogs

Someone on the Austin Reddit board asked which were the best thrift stores for mid-century furniture. Oh, how the Austin mid-century fans laughed knowing that every thrift store is picked over well before a reasonable person can expect to get there. It did however start a good list of vintage stores in Austin. So good that I updated my list, mainly by moving multiple stores to the “closed” section.

Doing so made me wonder about all the wonderful mid-century blogs I used to read. They don’t really show up in my RSS feed reader anymore. That’s because literally everyone is shut down or stopped posting years ago, even Retro Renovation. 

I have a sad feeling about it all. It feels like it was a Mad Men-inspired moment in time that’s probably passed. It also seems like a lot of it has shifted to social media. However, what I tend to find there is professional photography and vintage stores selling their wares. It’s a bit different.

I never considered Mad for Mid-Century finished, just on extended hiatus, but maybe it’s best to end it.

If you’re someone who used to read this blog and came back for a visit, thank you. I’m not sure if there will ever be additional content but I hope you enjoyed.

If you stumbled upon this mid-century blog for the first time through a Google search or some other means, please look around and give a read. I still check my MadforMidcentury email and comments are monitored.

And if you’re someone who’s still interested in reading a mid-century blog, let me know. I always wrote Mad for Mid-Century for myself but the community that was once around mid-century style and design was nice.

Our Mid-Century Modern Kitchen Remodel

We knocked a whole lot of items off our to-do list with a complete remodel of the kitchen and nook, including removing the wall, putting in a breakfast bar, new (matching) cabinets, new counters, new ceiling lights, new (matching) floor, replacing the back splash with tile and fixing all the electrical problems.

Before:

During

After

The Mid-Century Modern Art of Pyrex Designs

I've been hunting vintage Pyrex bowls at estate sales recently. They scream mid-century kitchen and look great even if you don't have a full set. 

Pocono Modern has an entire line of Pyrex-inspired art that you can hang right alongside your Pyrex collection. The Pyrex designs make a perfect transitions to paper, even when they're simplified and streamlined to give them a more modern look.

The good thing about Pyrex and Pocono Modern is that no matter what color your kitchen is, they probably have something that matches.

Mid-Century Exit Sign Typography

Sometimes you just have to look around you to find amazing mid-century design hidden in the details. This exit sign is in a 1950s building I'm in about once a week, but today was the first time I looked above the door to see it. I love the typography on it. The E that almost closes in a circle, the T that has a loop – you don't see signs like this much anymore in our sans serif, safe font world.

Mid-Century-Inspired Art by Human Shaped Robot

If the walls of your mid-century modern home could use a little more love and color, Human Shaped Robot has well-priced prints that can help. Their work has a modern grunge and pixel feel while still keeping true to its mid-century inspiration

If you want to add a little more kitsch to your kitchen, Just Like Moms is just for you.

Or if your media room needs something a little more analog, check out the Radio Dial.

Broyhill Facet Furniture Info

Sometimes you just have to wait for an answer. Sometimes you have to wait a while. Two years ago I got a question about the Broyhill Premier Facet furniture; a line I knew, and still know, little about. Recently though a reader was kind enough to point me to a listing on Urban Dwellers.

Urban Dwellers confirmed my assumption that the Facet furniture line was made sometime in the 1960s, but that's where things take a twist.

"Broyhill Facet was produced for less than one year before being discontinued, as the production cost was deemed too high. Almost no pieces from this series exist; a shame, as the design is entirely independent from the popular Brasilia, Sculptra and Saga series. The dresser is fashioned from a solid hardwood base overlaid with light-toned walnut veneer."

So there's good reason that there's little info about the Broyhill Facet line floating around; Broyhill Facet furniture wasn't around very long. Hopefully as more people see the line and fall in love with it (for good reason), more information will surface too.

Space Age Travel Posters from NASA

Nothing inspires the mind like travel, except maybe the idea of interplanetary travel. That's what makes these travel poster's from NASA the perfect addition to any kid's room. 

They're pretty clearly inspired by WPA national parks posters, with some influence by classic mid-century travel posters and maybe even a touch of Justin Van Genderen's work.

You can't buy them, but you can download print-quality versions here.

Mid-Century Kid's Book: Walk This World

Walk This World has the clean-line, mid-century look that feels right at home in any mid-century house, but also has all the modern-day travel lessons that every travel-themed nursery should encapsulate.  

It's beautiful on every level. Plus, what kid doesn't love a book that has pop-ups?