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Ample Closet Room and Generous Window Space

March 06, 1931
Detroit News Quilt History Project; Michigan State University Museum; Susan Salser
Detroit, Michigan, United States
A column from the Interior Decoration Department home series describing the Houston house.
Ample Closet Room and Generous Window Space
Excellent Wall Spaces for Furniture: Provisions Made for Three Sleeping Rooms and Bath on Second Floor
Every family entertains the desire and ambition for a home of their own. The original thought or dream, in most cases is quite apt to one indefinite as to plans and requirements, and is generally a vague mental form, color and style. It becomes a compilation of a dozen or more farm houses, seen perhaps from a train window, pretty little village or city bungalows passes on a weekend motor trip, or from hurried glances, through periodicals illustrating entrancing homes with inviting doorways. The dream team from then on becomes more clear, though always changing. Sometimes it has long, low roof lines and again the sharp English gables. Another time it will have a stately southern colonial columns and then merge into the rambling Spanish bungalow. Finally, a preconceived picture is definitely engraved on the mind which is eventually decided on as the only house to build.

This is the natural process and the only one which people building for the first time can pursue and be assured that they are selecting the home plan that will meet their desires and ambitions.

But in the final analysis the home must meet the family requirements from every angle and not exceed in cost the ability to pay without a sacrifices on other necessities and the luxuries which make life a little more pleasant and that every family is entitled to.

It is for the express purpose of assisting people who are seeking a small house plan that will meet their desires and ambitions that The Detroit News conducts this Home Building Service. A plan has been published every Sunday for the last eight years and reprints of these are kept on file for free distribution to those who select the ones which appeal to them from the sample books which are always accessible at the main office or at the Public Service Bureau in the Majestic Building.

The layout of the room in the house presented today's shows with what care and consideration each problem of home making and housekeeping has been solved. Windows, of which there are a generous number, have been so placed as to allow for an excellent setting of the furniture.

Although the plans for only the lower floor have been shown there is a space on the second floor for three sleeping rooms and a bath.

The following are suggestions for the decorating and furnishing of the interior:

Living Room: Woodwork, to be finished in a rich sand shade, walls to be paneled with wood molding and paint and stippled in a shade as near as possible to the woodwork; floor covering fawn and beige small all over pattern Wilton, glass curtains, coarse ecru fillet net, over draperies, very dark rich rose and gold damask, furniture, sofa covered in very dark rose, with a pair of extra pillows covered in dark rose damask, armchair with seat and back covered in needlepoint tapestry, table desk chair for this seat covered in black and gold striped damask, octagonal table with lamp of deep blue pottery with shade of beige georgette over taffeta and trimmed with silk braid to match the georgette wrought iron bridge lamp with shade of plain parchment pair of end tables, each to have lamp with an Italian pottery base and shade of decorated silk in harmony, over mantel decoration to be floral picture in dark shades, each end of mantel shelf to have pair of bronze and crystal candelabra, electric fixtures to be equipped with shades of plain parchment in pale gold shade.

Dining Room: Woodwork, pale green, walls to be paneled with simple wood molding and finished in the same tone as the woodwork, and if desired the molding may have just a bit of gold rubbed in the high parts, floor covering, fawn Wilton, glass curtains like those...

... fon over rose taffeta and trimmed with a ecru silk braid.

Rear Bedroom: Woodwork, ivory walls, treated with silver and apricot striped paper, floor covering turquoise blue, glass curtains, like those in the other bedroom, over draperies turquoise ground cretonne or chintz with bouquet design in apricot, yellow, amethyst, and a touch of rose, furniture, ivory trimmed with turquoise and to consist of full sized chair dresser and dressing table, single chair and upholstered chair with slip covering of apricot linen piped in green, bedspread apricot linen, trimmed with flounces and hands of the drapery material, dresser covers, turquoise linen edged with a cream linen lace, electric fixtures to be equipped with shades of apricots chiffon over taffeta of the same shade and trimmed with a simple silk braid to match.

Bath Room: Woodwork, cream walls, apricot, curtains, apricot organdie edged in turquoise.

Courtesy of The Detroit News Archives.

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