oh, I'll just say it...

I think I like a lot of that stuff.

:o

(not the panelling, though)

My parents' 1970s kitchen had bright yellow and orange and green with butcher block counters. I remember it as a happy place.

I love most of those rooms. Love.

I love most of those rooms. Love.

I love most of those rooms too! Maybe not as much as Westsider40 since I'm only going to post it once.... I think.

Aaaahhhh, I had forgotten about "conversation pits".
Much of the other furniture has come back around to be fashionable.

These pics are all from Interior Desecrations site, and all from the same 1971 Better Homes & Gardens magazine no less, but even they can't compare to the atrocities from a home-decorating book from the same era I found in my parents' old house and need to scan in one of these days. Particularly horrific are the "before" and "after" pictures, where perfectly elegant "before" rooms were sullied with all manner of lucite chairs, garish wallpaper on the ceiling, and every other totem of bad taste from the nadir of fashion (both residential and clothing).

Proof a few had to be "on something" during the era. Some of those rooms make me wonder how my nerves could deal with them on a daily basis. As with any era, decor books/mags always go a bit over the norm to start a trend. Wonder what we will be thankful for in the future that went away from today.

When we bought our first home in 1992, it still had all of the 70's wallpaper and window treatments. I stood in the bathroom unable to figure out where to plug in a hairdryer. The outlet covers had been meticulously camouflaged with matching wallpaper remnants!

Of course, the switchplates were covered too, IDrive. You can't be so lazy as to leave them unfinished, sitting there ugly and neglected. Frankly, tacky. It'd ruin the whole room.

The thing is, that stuff looked COOL. It looked fantastic! It made what it replaced look drab, spiritless, denervated. We studied every magazine that came along for ideas to copy so we could create a personal version for ourselves.

Just wait. As the group moods that captured us at various points change and change again, we all end up wondering that we loved those barrel shades SO much then. Regretting we threw out that "tacky" old 90s table that we now see as a pearl in the hands of swine. Wondering how long we have to hang onto the 2005 bedroom set, the most expensive furniture we'll EVER pay retail for because we thought it was so worth the investment.

And the "what-were-they" days will never only be a thing of the past. Emagineer, I have one idea about what we might see looking back. There's more than one way to be way too jangly. Even though most of us have become used to the current version and scarcely notice it, over the past few years I've often experienced the noisy clanky, acoustically graceless rooms the current dearth of softening influences means and think what some nice coordinating orange plaid wallpaper, curtains, and broadloom could do for them. Or something like that...

lee: those are some improvements if I've ever seen them heh heh heh.

We *must* find a larger image of this:

Can't get much more practical than thick wall-to-wall carpeting in your kitchen. Tasteful? I won't go there......

lee676 -

If you take out the carpeting, that kitchen is a twin to the one in a childhood home built in 1977. My mom was so excited to be building her first house -- brand new toilets! To add complete perspective, we were sitting at the builder's office picking out the finishes when we heard the news that Elvis had died.

Actually, the kitchen in Graceland doesn't look all that different:

I was a little kid when Elvis died and at that time knew him only as the mid-'70s Vegas crooner. Thought he was kind of like Wayne Newton.

Elvis's game room. Was there some kind of rule in the '70s that everything had to match?

What always amazes me is, at that time, we thought that stuff was "da bomb". I have mother's old decorating books and sewing books from the 50s and 60s and the styles are so awful (but the basics never change.) So I look at what we're doing today that we think is "da bomb" and wonder if in 30 years, people will look at our lovely decors and think, "How could they ever do such a thing! What were they thinking!"

And of course, just a few years after you get rid of grandma's old stuff, it suddenly becomes "in" and "valuable" and it's all gone. Why can't it become "in" while we still have it???

My grandmother had the old craftsman style quarter sawn tiger oak furniture which was so dark and clunky. Mother got rid of it all....little did she realize!

Can anyone explain why conversation pits were so popular in this era? I've seen them in real estate listings of untouched homes of the same era in my city and I've always wondered "Why?". At least in some in this listing, it looks as if you have to climb up and down the seating just to get in and out of the pit.

psssst---beekeeperswife--I like a lot of it as well. Shall we start a club? I even like the luann plywood bits...and I've always had a thing for grass cloth.

Not most of the wallpaper...though the funky birds are wicked cool...and I like the "Arabian Nights" bedroom...I'd have LOVED to have that bedroom when I was a young teen in the '70's.

I like several of the rooms linked to in the first post as well.

{{!gwi}}

This isn't much different than the living room in the house I lived in when I was a teenager. It had the lowered section in half of it, although there was a railing around it (what else would keep people from inadvertently falling onto the couch, or stepping on the heads of people sitting on it?). I'm not sure why "conversation pits" had a short day in the sun in that particular era, but I still like the general idea - I like rooms that encourage socializing. But there needs to be an easy way to enter and leave the area, and stepping backwards shouldn't allow you to fall into the pit.

One problem with conversation pits is that if there's a basement below it (as there was in my place), the ceiling in that section of the basement is really low. I suppose you could have the basement have stairs and a lowered section too, but that would break up the basement annoyingly. And building the entire basement with a lowered floor so you'd have ample height under the convo pit would significantly increase costs.

{{!gwi}}

I'm not sure what this room is all about though. Why is there a big "2" on the wall? A celebration of couplehood? (nah, bed's too small). A bedroom for a two-year-old? (can't be, that's not a crib if it doesn't have siderails). Actually, what exactly is that piece of bed-like furniture? The frame juts out just enough to make sitting on the edge incredibly uncomfortable. And that big white square on the other wall? (maybe it's 20, not 2). I haven't a clue.

Many of those rooms have at least some elements that look interesting. I like the panelling. The wallpaper is mostly atrocious though.

> I look at what we're doing today that we think is "da bomb" and wonder if in 30 years, people will look at our lovely decors and think, "How could they ever do such a thing! What were they thinking!"

I frequently say, good design is timeless. Follow the prevailing trends and you often won't get stylish; you'll instead get faddish. I've always avoided whatever the hot new thing may be, and as a result it doesn't look out of fashion a decade later.

Re: 2 on the wall and all the weirdness in the two room.

LOL! I know. And what's the coffee mug doing in the foreground AND displayed on the shelves among the kids' toys?

I'm not saying it would be comfortable or safe, but the bed looks as if might be meant to groooow with a child (from age 2 to 20?) Maybe that's a mug for milk and cookies. :)

And there are teddy bears on the back shelf. But everything else in the room looks inappropriate for a toddler's room - sofa pillows? Built-in drawers on the back wall that no kid could reach? A tall, narrow bookcase that's even further out of a kid's reach, filled with coffee mugs and office supplies? The lamp looks rather adult-ish. And then there's that serving cart. Just where are you supposed to eat? There's no chair. You can't readily wheel it over to the bed, thanks to the world's thickest rug. I suppose you can sit on the rug when you eat - thick furlike white carpeting is difficult to keep clean, but then again, 2-year-olds never spill food or drink on the floor, do they?

The subdued solid grey or taupe on the walls is the antithesis of typical kids' room decor, which I actually like and would have preferred to the bright colors my childhood room was painted. And there appears to be a live tree in the room, visable at the top right corner.

Curiouser and curiouser....

I think that IS a room that can grow with a child. As to stuffed teddies and toddler trains in a young adult's room--didn't you have a beloved something that you kept when you were far to old to play with it? And just had it on display?

yah! And if there's one thing you can't not have in a bedroom, it's got to be task lighting centered above the middle of the bed.

{{!gwi}}

In the days before texting, you would send messages across the room using pneumatic tubes.

> I think that IS a room that can grow with a child. As to stuffed teddies and toddler trains in a young adult's room--didn't you have a beloved something that you kept when you were far to old to play with it? And just had it on display?

I would have liked to, but my mom would throw it out when I wasn't there. I have *nothing* from my childhood or teens that I care about, save for a small number of photos I managed to hide.

As for the room growing with the child - maybe, but what a drag it would be to have to sculpt a huge "3" to plaster to the wall before the year is up, only to be replaced by a "4" the year after and so on. The bed thing does look like it can stretch, at least the frame part. I guest you just insert an additional cushion after you expand it.

BTW, no way I'm posting my age in big numbers on my bedroom wall. Don't want to be reminded....

Yeah, I was wondering about that pipe thing next to the big black sofa too. It looks exactly like the PVC flue pipes that poke outside the house from new furnaces or hot water heaters. Have no idea why anyone would put that nasty stuff on a living room end table. There's one near the back of the room, too.

,Can anyone explain why conversation pits were so popular in this era? I've seen them in real estate listings of untouched homes of the same era in my city and I've always wondered "Why?". At least in some in this listing, it looks as if you have to climb up and down the seating just to get in and out of the pit."

Conversation pits were popular because people actually had conversations. No computers, no cell phones, no texting. You actually looked people in the eye and talked.

No matter what the era or style, good meals were cooked, people loved each other and homes and families were created. I'm sure that 30 years from now we will see comments on our sterile stone and stainless steel kitchens.

By the way, the conversation pit made it easier to pass around the peace pipe, if you know what I mean.

,Can anyone explain why conversation pits were so popular in this era? I've seen them in real estate listings of untouched homes of the same era in my city and I've always wondered "Why?". At least in some in this listing, it looks as if you have to climb up and down the seating just to get in and out of the pit."

Conversation pits were popular because people actually had conversations. No computers, no cell phones, no texting. You actually looked people in the eye and talked.

No matter what the era or style, good meals were cooked, people loved each other and homes and families were created. I'm sure that 30 years from now we will see comments on our sterile stone and stainless steel kitchens.

By the way, the conversation pit made it easier to pass around the peace pipe, if you know what I mean.

Well that explains everything else we've been wondering about in these rooms

I also liked a lot of the pics from the Encyclopedia.

Lee676's photo of the plaid room on the other hand...Hoo boy! I laughed so hard I cried.
"Honey, can you come let me out of the family room? I can't find the door again."

I think the PVC things in the photo with the black sofa are lamps. You can see a pool of light on the table and in the back on the artwork.

My junior high school had two conversation pits.

...what a drag it would be to have to sculpt a huge "3" to plaster to the wall before the year is up, only to be replaced by a "4" the year after and so on.

They're probably already cut and stacked under the big, fluffy rug. ;)

> the plaid room on the other hand...Hoo boy! I laughed so hard I cried.
"Honey, can you come let me out of the family room? I can't find the door again."

Yeah, the white frame around the door really ruins the room for me. Surely there was enough plaid wallpaper left over to cover the molding so the door would become even more invisible. There's an uncovered wood table too, but at least there are two rolls of matching-plaid tablecloths ready to remedy that as soon as they're unrolled.

> I think the PVC things in the photo with the black sofa are lamps. You can see a pool of light on the table and in the back on the artwork.

I noticed that too. At first I thought it must be something else, but then realized it made perfect sense. I mean if I had embellished my living room with such elegant accoutrements, I'd certainly want to throw a spotlight on its two most stately, distinguished elements: the ashtray and the lower-right corner of the big red thing on the wall. You need to be able to easily find a place to throw the ashes from all the stuff you were smoking when designing this room.....

I just noticed the cello and music stand hiding to the right of the living room conversation pit. I wouldn't want to be the cellist - one not-so-careful step could send me and/or the cello tumbling into the pit. And the sofa wouldn't even cushion my fall, because it ends a few feet short of the wall.

On the other hand, kinda like how the TV is directly in front of the Lowrey organ; it's like the designer anticipated that sometime in the distant future, there would be some hoppin' cello-and-organ karaoke nights in the conversation pit. All saved for prosterity on the reel-to-reel tape recorder.

I was a little disappointed in the last picture. Where are the wallpapered switchplates? Outdoor trees? Large format numbers that must be re-hung annually?

However, upon closer inspection, there were a few 70's-fabulous elements that are a little more subtle. As noted, they made the mundane extraordinary by spotlighting the ashtray and centre of the red splotchy thing. Also, the use of PVC piping was an inspired choice for the lamps.

But really, those are baby features when compared to the couch. Could you possibly conceive of a couch less functional than this? It is the only couch design I have ever encountered that concurrently disables the abilities of SITTING IN, LYING DOWN ON, and GETTING UP FROM.

It is the anti-couch.

But really, those are baby features when compared to the couch. Could you possibly conceive of a couch less functional than this?

Showing my age here, but you know what that couch evokes to me?

"T minus 10 ... 9 ... 8 ...7 ..."

I just noticed the ceiling is mirrored

I was pregnant for a good portion of the middle-70s. I was imagining trying to get in and out of that launching pad sofa. Probably would just have gone with having the babies in place.

We actually decorated our little kid bedroom in the 70s. We went with half wall paneling and green and orange Noah's Ark wallpaper above. My sister painted Mr and Mrs Noah on the foot of the crib. That Noah's Ark wallpaper stayed there until they boys were nearly in middle school. Then we painted the upper wall blue. The paneling stayed until about 2000.

> As with any era, decor books/mags always go a bit over the norm to start a trend. Wonder what we will be thankful for in the future that went away from today.

Two words: "subway tile"

The bedroom with the white lacquer four poster and scenic wallpaper belongs to someone who posts in GW.

The bedroom with the white lacquer four poster and scenic wallpaper belongs to someone who posts in GW.

This one? That is wild ... howdja know that?
{{!gwi}}

3" wall-washer recessed lighting shaped like the constellations over the bed = brilliant

My father loved modern interiors and our house looked like some of those rooms. After my father's untimely death at a young age, my mother remarried and her choice of furniture was Colonial with pineapples and well sort of hideous. No wonder I am lost somewhere in the middle of all of that influence. I still sometimes wonder whatever happened to our orange tufted leather sofas from my father's era. I also wonder if my mother felt repressed by my father's love of the modern since she never ever again had a piece of modern furniture.

Did you notice that the bedposts match the wall treatment? It looks like the bed is actually adding extra spires to the castle in the background. Like a trompe l'oeil.

You can't fault the creativity.

"By the way, the conversation pit made it easier to pass around the peace pipe, if you know what I mean."

Ah, that makes sense. I guess I never thought about that specific activity.

"Conversation pits were popular because people actually had conversations. No computers, no cell phones, no texting. You actually looked people in the eye and talked."

I do understand that the 1970s were certainly a social era. Perhaps I'm out of touch with the generations younger than me, but I'm fairly certain people still have conversations. I absolutely understand making a seating area just for conversations. But what I'm wondering is: why a pit? Why not just a circular or semi-circular seating arrangement? Did it make the room feel more open? Make the conversation area feel more intimate? I've never been in one and have always wondered what drew people to the idea of a pit.

Yes, that belongs to someone from GW, and they had posted it because they needed to have it refinished.

I had asked "One like it or that exact one, because the picture looks like it is from a 1960s decorating magazine", And then they posted some more recent pictures of it. The room had been done for a relative I believe.

I also think rooms 1,3,6,7,14,16,17, & 18 hold up pretty well in a design sense except for some of the colors.

Wouldn't want to sully this beautiful kitchen with a boring white refrigerator, wouldya? Would work great in the plaid room too - not only could you not find your way out, you couldn't find the fridge either. On the plus side, it does make it easier to lose weight when you can't find your food.

Yeah, I don't know what the deal was with conversation pits as opposed to just arranging a few couches into a U shape. Doesn't it discourage socializing by making you walk down a few stairs to do it? Especially when you have to walk around to one side to access the only staircase as in the above picture.

...you couldn't find the fridge either

...or the dinnerware to put food in, 'cause you stashed it in the kid's room.

Oh, gawd, I remember those ubiquitous stylized flowers!!

The house I grew up in had walls painted in a nice muted color until my mom decided in the early '70s to put up stylized-flower wallpaper (even worse than that above, in all the ubiquitous '70s colors like avocado and harvest gold). By the '90s she hated it and kept badgering me to remove it and paint the walls again. I kept asking why she put it up in the first place if she thought it was so awful. "It looked bright and cheery at the time". I was like, "no, Mom, it looked goofy even way back then"....

When she moved out of the house, I helped pack everything up and discovered several unused rolls of that wallpaper. I'm waiting to find the right room to defile with it....