Isn't it a generational thing? If your parents had it, it's dated. If your grandparents had it, it's classic.

To me, it's dated when the average person can identify the decade right off the bat. It's classic when you can't.

I'm trying to parse this. I don't think it's completely generational because my parents have both MCM things and a kitchen my mother installed in the 90's that I still think are really nice. My grandmother had some truly hideous stuff.

A big difference between the two is that my grandmother bought only cheap things, and my mother has always paid a lot for quality.

All the pretty detailing (molding, original built-ins, floors, etc.) we like in older homes is usually only present in middle class or high-end homes from whatever era. So I think classic items almost always start as an expensive/especially well-made item even when they were new.

And if they were were never a bold/statement piece -- more of an accessory or a supporting character. Stuff with simpler lines in boring colors is less likely to go out of style because it doesn't fight with what is currently in style. This is why black and white tile from the Victorian, Art Deco, and 50's eras is still appreciated today, but all the crazy color tiles people used at various times are regularly ripped out.

Natural materials -- wood (especially unstained -- some of the stains go out of style pretty fast) and stone stick around for a long time too.

And I think it helps if whatever it is was never THE thing or THE trend for the era. For example, white subway tiles fit a lot of the above -- simple, clean lines, boring color, and can easily be well-made or installed particularly well. But it's been so popular in the past 5-10 years that I think the ubiquity at this point in time by itself is going to doom subway tile to not being classic. If there ever was a time when people were well and truly tired of whatever it is because it had been used SO much, then that item is definitely going to be dated for a bit.

Dated. If everybody had it because it was totally "on trend" or "in" at a time.

"They all laughed when I..." used (good quality) polished brass fixtures and hardware in my traditional-styled house in 2001. The house is classic in style, so why not the fixtures? "Brushed nickel" didn't exist in the classic homes I loved in RI.

About 40-50 years, but only if the formerly "dated" style suits the age and style of the house. So mid-century modern may now be classic in mid-century homes, but it still looks dated in Craftsman or Victorian homes. Give 1980s style another 15 years, and folks will be looking back to it when remodeling their 1980s houses.

It becomes classic as soon as you get rid of it.

"Dated" means that you can tell what date (within a few years) the kitchen was installed. Most of the time you can do that - just look at real estate listings in your city. "Dated" is usually caused by trends that got so huge that everyone agreed they were fantastic and they were mass-produced (for cheap) and mass-installed.

Flooring is a biggie for dating. Condo kitchens in my city almost always had 12"x12" ceramic tiles installed in 2001 when my former kitchen was built. You generally won't see that in current new condo kitchens in my city.

"Dated" isn't necessarily bad as others have noted. But, if you want to avoid your kitchen looking dated then don't choose finishes and products that would look right at home in a mid-market big box store or magazine right now. And be quirky and unique. Remember that, even when dated, quality ages more gracefully.

BTW, my new kitchen WILL look dated and I'm OK with that :) .

Anything following a trend will eventually become dated.

Anything done to your personal taste with special care taken to detail will always remain classic.

loonlake- As others have said- high quality becomes a classic.

Trendy colors tend to look dated - how many pink bathroom sinks and tile do you see in a newer house?

Glad to know that mid-century modern is back as I have several pieces of my parents' Willett furniture which was made in Kentucky in the 50s and is considered to be one of the best examples of MCM.

I say it's classic when it's lasted 2-3 generations and is still desirable. Classics also tend towards simple and functional -- otherwise, people ditch them before the necessary time can pass.

No, just because you love it, it isn't classic. If you love in in spite of what's trendy (or classic), that's personal style.

I'll give an example: I love stained glass light fixtures. They've been "a thing" a long, long time, so they satisfy the longevity requirement. But they're not trendy in today's color-phobic kitchens. Still, I like them so much that I'd like to have such light fixtures.

The thing about older styles coming back into fashion is they are are almost always highly remixed. You might rip an 80s golden oak kitchen out of a Victorian and put in a kitchen "appropriate to the style of the house" but even leaving out the appliances it's going to look absolutely nothing like the original kitchen.

So golden oak cabinets may come back in style at some point, but it won't be with partial overlay raised panel cathedral doors (at least I really really hope not :p )

I think MCM might be the one exception because some people do want completely period decor but still, most people mix and match.

I agree with Jillius that quality construction and clean lines are more likely to be considered classic.

Dated i$ alway$ cla$$ic....

I find this topic interesting as it relates to our house. It is estimated to be 180 years old and is a Greek Revival. The original part of the house has large moldings (including T-shaped molding above windows). To me it "dates" the house as it is fitting for the period it was built. It is gorgeous and a classic look replicated in many high end new builds.

However, the addition built in the late 1940s or 50s includes a bathroom with peach tile half way up the walls (and floor to ceiling shower stall) and a monster-sized hideous built in vanity. Clearly dating that portion of the house but not in a desired, classic way.

We recently renovated and extended the kitchen with elements many on this forum think will date it quickly - grey cabinets and white subway tile. We made some architectural choices to stay true to the house and definitely made it more suitable than the 1940/50 kitchen we pulled out. We don't care if it becomes dated because we love it! Perhaps the woman that chose the peach tile loved that for the rest of her life too.

I don't believe a kitchen should ever be coined a classic. As technology and lifestyles change, this area of the home should change with it. I say this as one of the few people I know with no a/c and chose not to install a garbage disposal - go figure!

Well, as someone who would love your peach-tiled bathroom, I would consider that MCM classic and wouldn't touch it. RetroRenovation.com is a website devoted to MCM style and started, in part, due to the desire to "Save the Pink Bathrooms!". I don't think your bathroom would look "dated" (gosh, I HATE that term) in an MCM home.

I like that you "made some architectural choices to stay true to the house". I think that's key between classic and not. I often think about what is true to the "bones" of the house. I think doing that will usually yield a kitchen (or any other room) that looks good in that particular house.

Hopefully, people have purchased homes that they like the "bones" of. So the decorating/remodeling choices made for that home fits both the home and the style preferences of the owners. Then you could end up with a perfect match and an end result that looks classic.

We purchased my parent's home. When they bought it in 1971, my mom was determined to make a MCM home look traditional and made choices that are incongruent with the home's "bones". The changes we are making honor those bones.

Of course, none of this means that we wouldn't be using modern conveniences. You won't be cooking solely on a wood-burning stove in your 1840 house. I will have a good hood not available when my house was built in 1949. I think considering the home's bones, determines the style of these modern choices. I wouldn't be putting a fancy wood hood with intricate corbels in a MCM home but you might in your Greek Revival.

I'm kinda rambling. Not sure I'm making sense to anybody but me. :) In short, there are many classics to choose from and what is classic in a particular home simply depends on that particular home, imho.

Funkycamper - I love it! When we realized how much our kitchen was going to cost we had to embrace the peach tile. I couldn't believe how many websites are devoted to them. I posted a reveal on decorating thread but here are the before and afters:

Another thing to consider... If you look at old decorating books, the kitchens that look the most dated are the ones that went with a whole theme - everything done at the same time with very matchy matchy materials. The kitchens that appear more classic look like they evolved over time or have a mix of different materials, appliances, etc., and are perhaps more quirky as Feisty68 noted.

I have a couple old decorating books from the 80s and the kitchens that look the best now weren't the ones that necessarily appealed to me back then. They may have suited the architecture of the house and the owners' individual taste, but they weren't as "on trend" as what I was looking for back then.

Now when I look at a house, that's exactly what I look for in a kitchen or any other room - how the owner has played up the architecture of the house and infused it with their own design sense and personality.

Lifestyle is a huge issue too. Is the kitchen designed for servants' use? A woman, by herself, working in a small, efficient, utilitarian space? A family prepping food, eating, and playing on devices? A couple showing off their gourmet cooking skills for dinner guests? The wildly different functions of kitchens of past decades have a huge impact on their layout, and that is part of how a kitchen becomes "dated".

I feel your frustration. This is a funny blog post - you might enjoy.

http://victoriaelizabethbarnes.com/a-manifesto-against-the-tyranny-of-luxury-kitchens/

Lily - thank you, that was a fun post to read. And it did make me feel a little bad for my brand new kitchen! Wow - the eye candy.

A specific trend I think will look dated in 10 years (or less!) are the drawers devoted to device charging stations. Maybe our phones will be solar - who knows? I see a generation from now opening a kitchen drawer and wondering why there are slots and outlets.

I completely agree with brdrl- our home was built in 1999 and had tons of top-of-the-line technology built in (home theatre, speakers in every room, etc). We bought the house in 2007 and ripped most of it out immediately because it was already completely out of date and useless to us. I would be very wary of hardwiring any technology into my house; I didn't even want to put a coaxial cable into our backsplash for the TV because I don't think we'll need it in a few years, but I lost that battle.

I remember reading somewhere that when building a house people should consider just running conduit pipes and putting the wiring for televisions and such through that. Then when it's time to update it's easy--just haul the old stuff out and thread the new stuff in. I have never built a house and I'm not an electrician so I have no idea whether that really makes sense or not.

I love Victoria Elizabeth Barnes' blog! Especially all the kitchen posts. I discovered her blog when for a brief moment we toyed with the idea of buying a Victorian fixer upper. Didn't buy the house, but have been enjoying the blog ever since.

Ok...on the tyrany article, she said let's not mess with our serviceable kitchens...and then she did?...

When I hear someone debate dated vs. classic the first thing that comes to my mind is appliance colors. If you go back far enough, appliances only came in white, and white is still fairly common in modern kitchens (although stainless steel seems to have taken over). Will there ever be a time that harvest gold or avocado color appliances from the 70's will be considered classic and we will be looking for modern appliances in these "classic" colors :) ? Maybe white is the only classic color that will stand the test of time.

Bruce

I think anything can be classic if it is well integrated in the house it's in, A bicentennial era kitchen with harvest gold appliances could be classic in a house from 1975, because it fits. Not everything about it needs to be maintained as a time capsule. I think it has to have skipped at least one generation of a different style of kitchens.

Nothing that's dated will ever be classic. ;) Classic is something, to me, that doesn't take on any of the heavy trends of it's time. From the beginning it is classic. That's really hard to do. Dated means it shows the year it was built and was probably a trendy kitchen at the time it was built. Little things we don't account for (style of sink, trim colors, light fixtures, dishwashers, etc) are what date your kitchen. I think a classic kitchen stats neutral. Like a little black dress, it's a little boring to some but always looks good. ;)

Is anything truly classic?

I agree with antiques, functional value, and simplicity.

It's funny, 40 - 50 years ago, when I was younger, homes in my area were ripping out marble tiles, mantels and cabinet tops because they looked so old fashioned. Harwood floors were to be covered with carpet.

They were "antiquing" cabinets and dressers with paint (green, orange, beige and gold with brown stain streaked over it.) Now they are chalk painting everything to death in pastels!

Maple finished colonial was the standard furniture decor, only to be replaced by heavy oak tables and chairs. (Heaven forbid you stil had chrome table and chairs!)

White kitchens were only for those who had to paint the cabinets because they couldn't afford new stained ones. And trim around the house was only painted because the wood was so chewed up through the years that it had gobs of wood putty on it.

I have no idea what to call my style these days. My home has knotty pine ceilings, walnut stained birch cabinets, a 60s style livingroom/media area, a rustic upstairs guest room, and a who-knows-what-you'd-call-it master bedroom.

Some of my furniture is 40+ years old. I just like that it is so sturdy, and functional. Many lamps are 50+. I just like how amber murano glass looks. I will have a home like no one else, so maybe I will save the humiliation of being "on trend" now and "dated" later.

I think the line between classic and dated has a lot to do with the context.

Case in point: our house was built in 1901, but the kitchen, front porch, and upstairs hallway/bathroom/bedrooms were renovated in 1952. Everything from the 50's looked horribly out out place and "dated." When we renovated, we took everything back to 1900's materials, colors, finishes, details, etc. Now, that stuff looks "classic" again (to me, at least!)

On the other hand, we have some friends with a spectacular 1950's bungalow with an original kitchen and bath. When they renovated, they refinished their kitchen cabinets with the same lime green paint, and put in bright red synthetic countertops with a stainless steel edge. Their kitchen is truly a classic in its context.

Love VEB's blog too!! She is so funny! Her kitchen is going to be beautiful when done.

I wish I had a way to see into the future...for design style purposes only. :) This seems to be my hang up at the moment. Am I only choosing because I've been brainwashed by the Internet, TV commercials, HGTV, etc. I'd truly like to be making the choice because I want it not because of undue influence. A room in my home is decorated once...it remains that way until don't like it anymore or at least ten or more years have gone by. Then I go crazy trying to find the perfect everything that maybe this will be more classic than the last. I have to say I am getting pretty good at it! :)