Small exterior makeover on 70's house
rachelk456
5 years ago
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Pics of small ranch houses (60s or 70s) that look great inside?
Comments (42)We also have a plain vanilla ranch built in 1950. It was never MCM nor any style. It was just churned out as a tract home. The basic layout of bedrooms and living space was ok, but we opened the wall between the kitchen and living room, extended and moved the kitchen so the old kitchen is half of the new one and partly as our new main level laundry room. The rest of the kitchen is part of the extension and is adjacent to the new den we added on. Due to budget constraints, we only cathedraled the new extensions' ceilings and the master bedroom ceiling was vaulted as we extended there too. Where we did not raise the ceilings we added in skylights and a 5ft eyebrow window in the front of the house, boxed in like a skylight (and we have a skylight over the den up high). The greater amount of natural light is fabulous and it feels so much more spacious with the openings for the skylights and eyebrow window. We had hated the all low ceilings when we moved in. Our previous house had vaulted and cathedral ceilings over the living spaces and it was hard to adjust to low and flat. I truly think that being able to raise the ceilings and/or use skylights is one of the best features about a ranch. Since the house was built with little style and updated with no style either (unless cheap and ugly are styles, lol), we felt free to create our own vibe. We went for retro modern with a 40s feel. What a modern person would have done prior to MCM is how I'd describe it. It has some deco feel to it but the lines are simple and not ornate. Crown moldings would not have worked, so we have done simpler ones. We chose modest looking but well designed materials. No one would ever think it is fancy or frilly. We wanted clean lines but not sharp edges. It is supposed to feel homey and unassuming. Like a well worn pair of jeans that fit well. We want guests to feel at home. If you come up with your own style mission statement you can check your choices against it. At one point, we fell in love with white marble and wanted that for our counters. Then one day, we figured out it went against all our other choices and was too elegant. We ended up with Corian in their Rain Cloud pattern, which mimics the feel of a white marble, but is not trying to fake anyone out. It has a softness to the look but with all straight lines and an eased edge profile, it looks neat. We ended up with Carrera marble in our master bathroom for the counter and in the faux rug part of our floor. That space is meant to be more grown up and fancy since it is our private space and not designed for the kids. The veins that make it great there would have been too busy for the kitchen. If we had gone for another look, I'd have loved to use the marble as I usually drool when I see it used anywhere. If I ever do a kitchen again, I would want qs oak with white marble or some other medium toned stained wood. The door style would be different as well. We are happy with our vision and how the look has turned out (the gc screwed us on condition, but that will be fixed, someday). It is not plain vanilla any more! Our house looks like no other in our area and I dare say, it is now one of a kind. Hopefully, you find your groove and your end result reflects your style and vision, and makes you smile too ;)...See More70s Split... Exterior Colour Suggestions?
Comments (4)Here are some more inspiration pics. If you want to use cedar, the logical placement is to continue the line from the overhang over the front door to the garage with the cedar from under the front door overhang to the bottom edge of the second floor. By painting the front door a modern color it would change the entire front. Good luck! ^ ^ ^ Note red front door Frank Lloyd Wright 1893 Winslow House^ ^ ^ Note continuation of garage and front entrance. Heavy trim. ^ ^ ^ Note horizontal trim, stone bottom section, use of color ^ ^ ^ Note heavy white trim to delineate house details, wood garage door and stone bottom section ^ ^ ^ Note white trim, wood garage doors, stone bottom section...See MoreUpdate Exterior on 70's House
Comments (9)Your triangle is called a gable, and I think the problem is that is protrudes forward of the wall below. If the gable wall were moved back inline with the wall below, it would look better, and you might have room for a small porch. Nice house, but I would not consider it a cape cod....See MoreThoughts on updating exterior 70s home with paint.
Comments (35)Since you already have a grey roof and new grey concrete, I would choose grey to match the existing colour of these two elements for garage doors and around the windows area. The gold windows trim looks good, so I would paint all trims and wooden elements of the house the same colour, including the garage beam and the garage frame (they are red-ish on my screen). I would put wood siding vertically above the garage beam to match the colour and stile of existing fence and trim (see pic). The same for the gable above the windows. It would give you more interesting look with additional texture. To enhance the contrast, I would change the lanterns to modern and black ones. The entrance might be stained or paint with fresh bright trim-fence stain/colour and the grey paint around....See Morerachelk456
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