Need help finding interior design ideas circa 1898-1917

[Olivia]

Hello everyone....

I've been working on my Garfield since christmas and am proud to say that I'm almost done building and about to start wiring it. My theme is actually going to be an old antebellum home in the south during the turn of the century time frame spanning 1898-1917. I am a stickler about authenticity and would love to have accurate wallpaper patterns, furniture design, etc....but I have yet to find a real or mini website that can just give me some historical info on what was in peoples homes and the styles during this period.

Most sites I've found havent been very helpful. I figure most of you have been active in the mini community longer than I and could perhaps send me in a new direction.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

-Olivia

[Peggi]

You can always watch "Gone with the Wind" to get ideas. LOL

Wooden floors with flowered area carpets. Sorry I can't help much, even being a southerner, I don't know many people who had these houses.

Peggi

[Peggi]

I stand corrected. (Told you I didn't know anyone who owned a mansion) LOL

I only mentioned that because the only house I can remember going in that dated back to the early 1800's belong to my DH aunt. It was by no means a mansion, a farm house really, but it had hard wood floors with the area carpets in the living and bedrooms. The kitchen did have linoleum. But it was added to the house later. I can still see his dear aunt taking those carpets out every spring and beating the living daylights out of them, even after she got a vacuum cleaner LOL.

Peggi

[Nameless1]

I wasn't trying to put you down, Peggi.

I'm feeling like I'm seen as a nasty know-it-all for simply repeating information that's available in reference books, so I'm going to delete my postings on this topic.

[Peggi]

Calamari--please don't delete your post. I didn't think you were mean or nasty. I actuallly found it funny that I , a true southern girl, born and bred, couldn't answer her question. That's one thing nice about the forum, you can learn things that you should've known but didn't because, you're surrounded by things and take it for granted. ( You know like giving directions, in a strange place you look for street signs, but where you live you tell them to turn at the blue house).

Please I did not take offense at all, and there is worlds of difference between mansions and farm houses.

Peggi

[Shakyshaky]

I don't know if you have looked here but kawarthalakesminis.com has period wall paper and some info on the time. I can't help much more with websites but do know of a few good books. I am doing a 1910 house at the moment.

Calamari we do not think you are a know it all. I really appreciate all you do to find out all those things we want to know but don't know where to look. It ment alot to me that you were able to find out that info for me about my house, otherwise I would never have found out.

[LisaN]

You also need to be more specific about what region of the South you are modeling your house on. Is it Louisiana? Cajun, Creole, French? There is a quite a large mixture of culture and traditions attached to the geographical location of each southern state.

I can speak from my own southern roots--most of Daddy's folks were from North Carolina. The floors would have been polished pine, like my great great grandfather had in his home he built in 1888. This is after reconstruction period--and after the 'war' as the old ones called it. remember back then screens were a 'new' invention, and the large grand plantations were actually just huge farms, where they produced tobacco, cotton, sugar, soy, corn, plus food crops to sustain the plantation's family.

Remember they just didn't decorate with gawdy Victorian furniture, this is America, so it would have been referred to as Federal, from my own research. Most plantation homes were enlarged and added onto as the families grew in wealth and status. You've stated the time--more or less the gay 90's to the first world war, so you could imagine the 'story' line that Grandpa came home after the war, made his fortune during reconstruction, and so on. Actually Peggi's idea of Gone With the Wind was not too far off the mark here- the book by Margaret Mitchell is even more historically accurate and a more true representation of what happened during reconstruction. The movie is mostly hollywood's protrayal. A good movie to watch for a turn of the century house in the early 1900's in the Alabama region is Fried Green Tomatoes. That old Victorian is gorgeous, and the decor might fit in with a late home during the first WWl .

These are some ideas--I used to work as a college student in The White House of the Confederacy as a tour guide in Richmond--years ago! so there was quite alot of history to research before I could give my tour. I hope this helps some Olivia.

[nuttiwebgal]

I'm feeling like I'm seen as a nasty know-it-all for simply repeating information that's available in reference books, so I'm going to delete my postings on this topic.

you should never feel that way!

I never think of you as nasty! you are the answer gal! we all know it! and I for one am fine with it!

I know if I needed info I would definatly ask you where to start the search!

everyone has special talents and yours happens to be research the hows and wheres!

you rock!

I love reading ALL the information you provide! you provide a valuable service!

now deal with it sweetie!

nutti

[LPCullen]

I wasn't trying to put you down, Peggi.

I'm feeling like I'm seen as a nasty know-it-all for simply repeating information that's available in reference books, so I'm going to delete my postings on this topic.

I know you would never do that. You're never seen as a nasty know-it-all either! Good heavens, if it weren't for you, I'd probably NEVER figure ANYTHING out! You are very very very very very much appreciated, especially by me, and I am always grateful for your help/input.

[Nameless1]

Peggi told me (kindly but firmly) to put info up, so let's see what I can come up with in the way of links. It's actually a tough decorating problem because much of the South was poor after the Civil War, so there wasn't money to redecorate and sometimes not enough money to pay for upgrades to new household technologies. In a rural area, people might have been using those portable oil lamps as late as the 1930s. (So if you've already electrified, your house is probably somewhere like Richmond that was old but was doing pretty well in the late 19th century.)

--PBS's Manor House: tons of info! It's British-focused and more moneyed than a Southern home was likely to be, but there weren't big differences in technology and design between the UK and US at that particular time.

--Rococo Revival style: this is what the homeowners would have bought during their pre-Civil War surge of having money. It was hugely popular in the South, much more so than rival styles in the same years.

--Arts and Crafts style was widely popular at the end of the 19th century. If your homeowners updated a room or two, this is one likely direction, especially the new trends in wallpaper. Even more likely, though, if a scion's marriage brought money into the family, is a move in the direction of Art Nouveau, which goes well with the love of curvy stuff seen in Rococo Revival.

--Heritage Homes is broadly general, but it gets floors and "golden oak" right.

There are tons of books on Victorian decorating, though a lot fewer that make it to the Edwardian period. If you decide that the family lacked money after the war, Winkler & Moss's Victorian Interior Decoration is outstanding for covering the earlier periods, from floors to furniture to wallpaper to draperies. I've yet to find an Edwardian-era book that I swear by, rather than at.

Now, finding miniatures is a whole 'nother ball of wax, and since all my houses are contemporary, the one thing I can contribute is that Brodnax Prints does period wallpapers for at least some of the relevant time periods.

[heidiiiii]

There are books out there that is a series called Images of America. I have the 2 made for my town of New London.

You might be able to find them on Ebay or local library. They make them for just about every state. They show old photos of houses and streets. What ppl wore in those times. Even inside of the houses.

I can look in my two books and see if there are any good photos of inside the homes and post them in gallery.

[grazhina]

Okay, stickler for authenticity.

I used to have some other sites, but I went weeding through things a while ago downloading the info I wanted and dumping the links.

If I'm seeing the image of the household correctly, keep in mind that their furnishings would probably include a lot of Grandma's and great Grandma's stuff. If they were a modern family for their time, they would have been into what was really in back then, Colonial . Everybody thinks of Arts and Crafts as being hot, but the vast majority of people were into Colonial looks and furnishings.

Vintage Designs has some very interesting pages.

http://www.vintagedesigns.com/id/index.htm

I've got some photos for that period in my webshots albums. "1900 bathrooms and kitchens", "Victorian rooms" has some images that would fit the era, just look for the dates, "Willowbrook Village" also has suitable images that would fit into that time frame, depending on what you had in mind for the "look"

http://community.webshots.com/user/grazhe

This place has good wallpaper links for you to check through.

http://www.historicwallpapering.com/links.htm

The following are some of the interior decorating books that you can access online for that period. You can page through them and see if there's anything helpful. I've got some more on my list if you're REALLY into it.

THE DECORATION OF HOUSES

1897

http://hearth.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/te...th;idno=4391478

HOW TO BUILD, FURNISH AND DECORATE

1897

http://hearth.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/te...th;idno=4502475

THE COMPLETE HOME 1906

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16650/16650...50-h.htm#chap06

Decorating and taking care of a home, down to kitchens and laundry, what you need to buy as far as kitchen wares go, household chores, Mon…Tues…Wed, etc. a useful book

THE HOUSE: its plan, decoration and care

1907

http://hearth.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/te...th;idno=4305483

PRINCIPLES OF HOME DECORATION With Practical Examples

1903

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/14302/14302-h/14302-h.htm

PRINCIPLES OF HOME DECORATION

1903

http://hearth.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/te...th;idno=4601523

THE FURNISHING OF A MODEST HOME

1908

http://hearth.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/te...th;idno=4305889

I also got a really cool book out of the library a couple of days ago. TWENTIETH CENTURY DECORATION, by Stephen Calloway. It's one of thouse humongous things chock full of pictures, discussing the change from the late 19th century onwards.

I do have more images on my CD's of the period that I amassed in the last few months. The thing is, my Webshots site is getting unwieldy. In order to put on new pix of rooms I'll need to dump old ones. I guess I'll have to tend to that someday.