Home Tour – July 21st 2019

We are thrilled to announce an exciting collaboration with Lubeznik Center for the Arts [LCA]. We have agreed to host LCA’s Sustaining Members for a series of tours on Sunday, July 21st. There will be three one-hour sessions beginning at 10:00 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. Each Sustaining membership includes admission for two people to one of these tours. If spaces remain, we will make them available to other LCA membership levels.

Sustaining Members can RSVP by calling (219) 874-4900 or emailing mshirk@lubeznikcenter.org. If you are not currently a Sustaining Member but wish to attend, you can purchase a Sustaining Membership over the phone, in person or online at www.lubeznikcenter.org

Logs to Lustrons

Every year Indiana Dunes National Park with Indiana Landmarks host a ‘Logs to Lustrons Tour‘, it takes a full day to get to see all the homes and really is a fantastic event. This was our second year attending, and each year they add a few new homes or there are some amazing updates to learn about. We recommend that you keep an eye out for next years event and buy your tickets, it is typically the first weekend in May. Here are some of our photos from the event. Please excuse us – we were enjoying the narrative too much that we didn’t really get good shots.

Let’s start with our new favorite house in our area  – Read Dunes House. The owners of this home [and within the this home] advocated for the Dunes preservation and successfully so, the Dunes just became the 61st National Park in the USA. Phil Benham Read and his wife Irene commissioned their architect son Herbert P Read to design the weekend house. It is currently managed by the National Park Service and they are hoping to restore it and make it available for rentals. Let’s hope their plan works – it is a gem.

Another highlight on the tour [not all homes are open for interior tours] was the Schulhof Lustron home. What is unique about this Lustron is that it is a three bedroom model, and fewer than 200 models were made. This house was built in 1949, originally it sat on the lakefront, and in 1956 had to be moved due to beach erosion. Lucky it was a Lustrous, they were designed to be moved. Anyone want to help out and lease this one and restore it? Contact the parks for details on their leasing program.

Oops – I guess we shouldn’t be nosey and look in peoples drawers.

Loads of original features – but it needs some serious work to get it back in working order.

OK two more highlights to share. This one we are SUPER excited about. It is stunning.

Right next door to the Lustron, is Dr. John & Gerda Meyer House. Originally built as a one story home in 1961, it had an addition added to it in 1965. The lower level opens onto dune woodlands, and the upper level overlooks Lake Michigan. It was designed by Harold Olin [who also was an advocate for preserving the Indiana Dunes]. What makes us excited about this home, is that it will soon be available for rentals. If you want to get in to be one of the first to stay at this stunning home – you can do so thru this program. We didn’t take any photos that do this place justice – the bedroom is filled with clever storage ideas. such a beautiful home with incredible views – again photos we didn’t take – we were too excited to be able to finally get inside this gem.

This wall panel below is brilliant. Between the two horizontal wood strips are removable glass panels – that you can place art behind, and switch-out. Perfect for displaying photography straight out of the darkroom that is on the right. Downstairs has the original kitchen with another upstairs.

The dining room has panels that can be closed to convert the dining room into a bedroom, and it is cleverly attached to a jack + jill bathroom too.

Lastly, the Solomon Enclave. Party central. These homes / apartments are also on the list for being converted into rentals homes, managed by the National Park Service. Three homes built on a sub-divided lot, with views to the lake. The homes have plenty of the original features in tact, designed for summer vacations there is plenty of glass and screened porches. This will truly make a great spot for family reunions and large gatherings once it is back up and restored. We can’t wait to see life back in these building.

Anyway, just a quick tour – we are not going to share all the details – you just should sign-up and go next year. It really is a great day, and there is a stopping point where you can grab some lunch from the newly opened Goblin & Grocer.

Kitchen – Standing the test of time

Our kitchen was truly built to last. Since we moved in on May 27th 2016 we have given the kitchen and it’s appliances a workout. We love to entertain, and this kitchen was designed for entertainers that like to cook and not just serve cocktails.

The kitchen was made by Mutschler, they are no longer in business, and it is ashamed as they really knew how to build a kitchen that stands the test of time. Our preservationist hearts say keep it as is [and we will], our modernist hearts say ‘you know if all we did was reface the cabinets + change counter tops + update appliances this kitchen WOULD look like it would fit with current trends. The hardware and cabinetry are solid – they even have soft closing drawers, the layout is great and the size if perfect.

Here is a view of the kitchen from the real estate listing, and as you can tell nothing has changed, with the exception of some accessories and the flooring. We updated the flooring to unify with the rest of the house.

The appliances are all electric and made by GE, they are in copper-tone finish. The fridge has selves that are easy to adjust up and down along, but our favorite feature is the swing our shelves so you can easily clean and access anything that is shoved to the back.

The butter conditioner works as it states, the butter truly will be hard  – medium – soft.

The double ovens feature a dinner dial, and have a working meat thermometer and rotisserie [it makes the best roast chicken].

YEP! We use these appliances everyday and they keep on producing delicious meals for friends and family. Just a quick tour … for now ….

 

 

Screened Porch – The Aviary

The screened in porch, we call ‘The Aviary’ is our favorite spot in the house, it is a vacation just to sip coffee in or listen to the birds in the garden. We are entering into our third season using the porch and it is always evolving. Originally, it was furnished with Woodard ‘Rose Vine‘ outdoor furniture [as pictured below from the real-estate listing].

These are a few shots just after we closed.

Whilst we still have the original furniture in storage, we have replaced it with the design classic ‘sculptura’. We mainly switched it because we have always coveted the design pieces, and when we had the perfect spot to put them – we started collecting vintage pieces. They were all white when purchased from etsy + eBay + charish, and we had a local company powder coat them black for us.

Year-after-year, the furniture remains in the same spot and is divided into two zones: a dining area that is located close to the kitchen; and a lounging area with views over the garden onto the pool. Planters are used to divide the ‘rooms’ up, and this year we are adding ‘flor’ tiles to make a rug. The rug will be placed under the main seating arrangement, just to mix things up, and to make it cozy under our feet when the sun goes down, the terrazzo can feel too cold for most of the year.

For plants, we have found that ferns seem to be the least maintenance, and will tolerate some hot weather and long spells without remembering to water them. The added bonus with the ferns, they can be found in Lowes in April and they last until January when the temps really drop.

The flooring is the original terrazzo Fritz tile, we found a box with some spare tile in the crawl space under the house. We used the same brand to add terrazzo inside.

Back to the Sculptura Chairs – we have been searching for a pattern, or an example of the cushions for the lounge chairs. I was able to buy a set of original pads for the dining table from F&F Vintage. As for the loungers, we had some made, they were expensive and not well constructed. So the search continues … but here are some photos of the original cushions in case anyone is looking for inspiration:

Even in the winter the space is lovely. We switch out the screened panels back to plexiglass-glass and hope that the ferns make it thru.

Paul McCobb – Glass Partitions

One of our favorite features in the house are the Paul MCobb designed glass partitions. There are two of them in the house. The first greets you as you enter the Front Doors, and the other separates the sleeping area from the dressing section in the Master Bedroom. We get requests for detailed shots for inspiration to enable home-owners to recreate the look or idea in their own home, so here we are sharing details.

The Glass was a collaboration between Blue Ridge Glass Corporation, based in Kingsport – Tennessee, and Paul McCobb – as apart of their patterned glass collection. We haven’t been able to find the company or details on what happened to them [we found this]. If you have any vintage magazines, keep your eyes peeled for some advertisments like the one below, apparently you could mail in and request a ‘project booklet’ for ideas on what to do with the glass.

We are not handy people with a hammer or any tool for that matter, so we can’t wax poetic on the process or details of construction. We can, however, take pictures and you can share these, or utilize them yourself [hopefully with more skills and technical know-how than us] to translate the construction methods.

The framework is the same on both sides with the glass sandwiched in-between, and is secured to the ceiling and the floor.

A few details of the glass itself – it is ridged on one side and smooth on the other.

We love waking up to see them greeting us in the morning.

Well – we hope these photographs and brief details help. Ask away with any other questions, and we will try our best to answer them.

Dezeen – Design Magazine

Thanks Dezeen for the feature. Fingers crossed this story telling will lead us to some new connections with information and/or tales of life in an Alside Home. We are close to finding 30 of the homes .. out of the known 96 that rolled off the production lines and there is a possibility there might be as many at 200. Check out the homes we have found so far – thanks to the power of social media – on our Alside Homes Locator page.

You can read the full article on Dezeen here.