Modernising houses in the 70's

[graduate_owner]

I was reading the editor's page from an old woodworking I'd been given, and he was saying about what we now recognise as misguided DIY activities of the 60's and 70's (as in ripping out Victorian fireplaces and picture rails, and covering panelled doors with hardboard). In my first house I ripped out some lovely old tiled cast iron fireplaces and either bricked up the openings or built stone-clad replacements. Also the picture rails came down, but the doors stayed panelled, although I do remember when I was about 14 my dad cladding our house internal doors with hardboard.

It all seems such a shame now, and looking at the prices being asked for reclaimed materials it's not cheap to return properties to 'original' condition.

Do any members have similar experiences (that they are willing to admit to)?

K

 

[tekno.mage]

We bought an edwardian terraced house in 1982 and had to reverse a lot of those 70s crimes. Luckily architectural salvage was in it's infancy then and original panelled doors, fire surrounds and cast iron fireplaces were still reasonably cheap. We did have to learn how to do plaster run work in order to repair and replace some original plaster coving that had been damaged or badly removed - and had to replaster a whole ceiling that had been artexed! I also learned how to make stained glass windows (using pieces from old damaged panels donated by our next door neighbour) to replace some that had been removed from the bay window.

 

[RogerP]

Barry Bucknell http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RVnzu0COFU

 

[Mark Hancock]

Always remember the late great Alan Mitchell saying how he felt guilty for the rise in DIYers in the 70s and what they did through his association with the magazines of that time

 

[Harbo]

My Dad hardboard-over all our doors then "grained" them!

Rod

 

[AndyT]

I remember helping my dad put hardboard over the doors in our 1930s house, and remove the picture rails.

In my current, Victorian house there is a rather ugly garden wall built with big chunks of white marble - the remains of a nice fireplace.

Strange thing, fashion.

 

[Woodchips2]

I helped my father put hardboard on the doors in our house, my grandfather's house and my aunt's house. It was all the rage and where I learned putting panel pins in hardboard often resulted in bruised thumbs :roll: They were also a pain to decorate because all those pins had to be punched down and filled

Regards Keith

 

[AndyT]

No bruised thumbs in our house... my dad had a pushpin!

 

[mailee]

I remember in our first home ripping off all of the hardboard from the doors, tearing down a badly built York stone fireplace and ripping the hardboard off all of the stair spindles that had been 'updated' in the 70's. :roll:

 

[Cheshirechappie]

I think I can sort of understand how the '70s craze for covering up Victoriana came about.

A couple of Christmasses ago, the family bought me a book of 'then and now' photographs of our home town, the 'then' being the '60s and '70s. Until you see them juxtaposed, you forget how drab, run-down, soot-stained and generally tired everywhere was in those decades. They'd as often as not been through the first war, then a prolonged depression, the second war and then '50s austerity, with lots of open coal fires, steam engines on the railways and other general pollution. Some places hadn't had much maintenance since before WW1 - whole streets, that is; not just individual houses and businesses.

Against that background, the urge to 'smarten things up' as the country gradually left post-war austerity behind must have been very strong. The fashion of the day was modernist - clean lines, minimalism - so Victorian and Edwardian fancy bits didn't fit the vogue.

True, we woke up. It was a rather gradual wake-up to what we were losing (perhaps the Euston Arch was the first example to gain any public recognition) but as the country became generally more prosperous during the '80s and '90s, people could afford to do restoration work rather than just a DIY makeover, and period detailing became more chic again as people started to understand it's aesthetic value. Now we have the whole gamut of the building listing system, conservation zones, and lots of people passionate about past glories - but back in the drab '60s and '70s, we just couldn't afford them. Thank goodness we can now - there's enough modern architectural mediocrity about, we need all the architectural aesthetic value we can get - new or restored old!

 

[graduate_owner]

Yes cheshire chappie, you have valid points.
Still hideous though.
And I'd completely forgotten about Artex (we had that too) and boxed in staircases, but luckily we didn't have that problem.

And all that 'modernisation' armed with only a Black and Decker D500 (single speed, 3/8" chuck) plus the attachments of course - circular saw, orbital sander etc.

K

 

[rafezetter]

I also learned how to make stained glass windows (using pieces from old damaged panels donated by our next door neighbour) to replace some that had been removed from the bay window.

Leaded lights dear boy, they are called leaded lights (and it exasperates me how often those on TV who should know the difference, don't.) Yes you Kevin McCloud, and Sarah Beeny, and those 2 on location, location, location.... and sadly most specialist glass sellers; rather than educate, they go along with the misnomer.

Leaded light is simply coloured glass on it's own, a la Remy Macintosh. Stained glass is where they paint on the coloured glass to shade, accent or put a design of some type, like church windows.

 

[graduate_owner]

Hey rafezetter,
don't you just love those imitation 'leaded lights' where they stick imitation lead (i.e. plastic) onto glass (for that authentic leaded light look). On a par with Contiboard I think.

K

 

[dericlen]

Can you beat this? I remember helping my granddad beating hair with two wood laths with nails in one end to break and comb out the knots prior to mixing into lime plaster, all by hand, it didn't have to be done quickly, lime plaster doesn't set in a great hurry!! A bit later;- cement, granddad thought "this new technology" how wonderful. Father started repairing his oak framed clay wattle and daub house (now listed) with the hard stuff, my sister is now having to undo most of this, poor father is turning in his grave! I must admit the slate DPC he installed has saved most of the oak cills. I could bore you for ages ,if I had the time!!

 

[Woodchips2]

Can you beat this? I remember helping my granddad beating hair with two wood laths with nails in one end to break and comb out the knots prior to mixing into lime mortar, all by hand, it didn't have to be done quickly, lime mortar doesn't set in a great hurry!! A bit later;- cement, granddad thought "this new technology" how wonderful. Father started repairing his oak framed clay wattle and daub house (now listed) with the hard stuff, my sister is now having to undo most of this, poor father is turning in his grave! I must admit the slate DPC he installed has saved most of the oak cills. I could bore you for ages ,if I had the time!!

Keep them coming, they're not boring to me just a fascinating insight into old construction methods that last for hundreds of years until we try and update them :roll:

Regards Keith

 

[dericlen]

Hot water system circa 194? Granddad modernized our living room by providing mother with a brick built water heater. Generally referred to as a "copper" but was actually a large cast iron bowl. The structure was built inside the large inglenook open fireplace, which also housed the open fire with hobs both sides. The brickwork started with an opening at the front from which to rake out the ash, then followed the iron work forming the grate and door to the fire box. These were either reclaimed from earlier demolitions or modernization projects, or made up by the local blacksmith, (most villages had one).The clever bit was now to form the flue way round the copper bowl to finish at the rear at "worktop" level flush with the top of the copper bowl. The flue-way was then continued higher up the main flue. The fire was lit, either to boil the "whites" (always on Mondays) or for the family bath (Saturdays). Water was rainwater from the tanks, from a land drain discharging into our boundary ditch or filtered water (through a corn sack, being thick and closely woven) from the pond. The bath was a long galvanized tin one kept hung on the wall outside. Bathing took place in front the fire, sometimes the tin sides got a bit hot!!
The last one to bath emptied the water (kept for watering the vegetable garden), usually father.
This a bit hurried, hope you can understand it.

 

[Woodchips2]

I lived as a child in a mining village in South Wales in a house with no bathroom and an outside toilet so the last post brings back many memories. We had two galvanized baths hanging outside, a bungalow bath for the adults and a smaller oval one for the kids. We bathed in front of the fire but you took care not to lean against the sides because it was freezing even with hot water in the bath. In those days no central heating, double glazing or draught-proofing so you didn't stay long in the bath.

My father worked in the mining industry and until the advent of pithead baths he would come home black all over with coal dust, the only white bits were his eyes and his teeth :roll: . When he arrived home my mother would get the bath filled and then wash all his clothes in a washtub. For those who look back with nostalgia to the 'good old days' give me the modern facilities any time #-o

Regards Keith

 

[Hemsby]

Bought our first house in 1972. It was a very large detached 4 bed house built 1898 in the middle of the town in Hampshire for £4500 There was no electricity supply to the house, gas lights 1 cold tap over the kitchen sink There was huge cast iron bath upstairs, this had a complicated "pop up" waste which consisted of a 4" cast iron pipe attached to the outside of the bath and linked underneath to the lead waste pipe it had two taps on the bath, neither connected but had 1 extra cold water tap over the bath.

The rising damp was about 4 feet up all the walls and all the floors were rotten & wormed. It was too much for me to do on my own so we employed builders. We had full central heating, concrete floors through the ground floor, re plastered and full electrical installation including supply to the property. Total cost of £2000 and we got a £1000 grant towards that.

The arrangement was that I would do all the donkey work removing all the flooring, plaster & rendering ready for the builders. Now comes the crime in addition to the 4 bedrooms there were 3 reception rooms, a total of 7 Victorian cast iron fireplaces including some brass fenders, out they came smashed with a sledge hammer (hammer) and used as rubble under the new concrete floors ](*,) Then there were the large quantity of brass wall & ceiling gas lights with glass shades they had the same fate. We must not forget the cast iron bath that was too large & heavy to get down the stairs so that go broken up with the sledge hammer (nearly bringing down the ceiling) that too joined the fire places & Lights

The final horrors, I covered all the lovely Victorian paneled doors with hardboard and because the ceilings were cracked and we could not afford to get them re plastered we covered them with the newly discovered product called Polystyrene Tiles =D>

Looking back now I think all those items destroyed apart from being a crying shame, at today's value they would probably paid for the house purchase :-({|=

 

[graduate_owner]

Yes, polystyrene tiles, I'd forgotten about them too. I put some up in 1 bedroom where the ceiling was cracked. And finished it off as a 'tidy job' with polystyrene coving - well, what else.

The there was the dreaded stone cladding, in grey, beige and even blue and pink shades. I am pleased to say I didn't have any of that.

I wonder what they'll say about today's efforts in 50 tears time !!

On the primitive home topic, my brother bought a house, it was originally 2 miners' cottages which had been knocked into 1, but it was still pretty small. There was a sink unit in one front room, about 6" away from the wall at one end and about 12" away the other end - yes, really. It was connected with cold water only. The hole in the stone wall was big enough to push a football through, and that's how it was left for quite a few years before my brother bought it. There wasn't much in the way of original features worth keeping in this case.
As for the electricity - one cartridge fuse wrapped in silver paper for the whole house, and an earth wire just hanging loose from the 'consumer unit', walls that tingled in damp weather, and bare wires in several places.
But at least it did have indoor water and electricity, though no flush loo.

K

 

[John Brown]

My father told me that when he was a lad(he was born in 1912) the men would mix up the lime plaster in a giant pit, and then the foreman would pull out a handful of horse hair from his waistcoat pocket and chuck it into the mix.
He hardboarded over our 1930s doors as well, and he had a pushpin. He had a hand held circular saw and a old Wolf electric drill as far as power tools went, and made his living plumbing, rewiring, installing heating and making and fitting kitchens and built-in wardrobes. He would probably given teeth for an electric screwdriver, but back then they were the sort of thing you'd hire - way too expensive to buy.