How to Decorate With Retro Colored Appliances

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There are many appliances available in kitchen retro colors now. Many of the older appliance companies, like Viking are now making these appliances in colors that suit different eras from the past. For instance Viking is making an entire line of gas stoves, fridges and steel cabinets in that long lost color from seventies known as Harvest Gold. You can also get colors from the seventies in the Viking brand in colors like Golden Mist, Apple Red, Mint Julep and Pumpkin. The Mint Julep really does resemble the avocado color from years ago and the Pumpkin is really a bright orange.

Any of these colors look absolutely fantastic when it comes to replicating a kitchen from the 1940s. The best colors though would be a maternity pink or green. Light pastels were common in that era as were white. Make sure there is lots of silver hardware on these appliances as well.

When it comes to the sixties you can star looking at all kinds of amazing colors including dove gray, creams, ivories, steel green, forest green, oranges, dark blues and purples. The colors get even intenser in color as the seventies arrive and that is when we get the odd puces and pumpkin colors that characterized the era. If you are shopping vintage look for doors with smoky glass fronts and fine varnished details. Yet another thing to look for is two-tone appliances. Sometimes you will find a stove that has a bit of harvest gold graduating into the green or a green with a touch of orange in it. You find one of these it is like finding a really great old vintage tie-dyed t-shirt.

Appliances from the eighties and nineties tend to be heavier with a dark burgundy, red, black or dark blue flair to them. Mustard, copper and mint green colors were also very popular in the eighties.

Once you start getting past the eighties the colors start becoming harder and more metallic. The appliance of preference is made out of glass and brushed metal.

They did not really have appliances as we know them in the Victorian era because most things were porcelain or cast iron. When in doubt it is best to go with a white colored with lots of black detail if you are trying to make an old Victorian home look as authentic as possible. However some of the old rounded fridges in green or red do suit a Victorian or Edwardian style home as well.

How to Decorate Your Lawn with Pink Flamingos

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Plastic pink flamingos are very tacky but also very cool. It is one of those lawn ornaments that are very much associated with American iconic kitsch. The pink flamingo has been around about sixty years and ever since they were invented there has always been debate about whether or not they were eyesores.

Pink Flamingos were originally made by a company called Union Products that started making them in 1946. It was part of their “Plastics for the Lawn” series. The company did not just make flamingos. They also made ducks, dogs and frogs. These first flamingos were not three dimensional. They were more like “signs” with flamingos painted on them.

In 1956 a company in Massachusetts called the Leominster hired a designer named Don Featherstone who figured out how to make the figurines into three dimensional free standing sculptures. The flamingos were based on figures found in photos in National Geographic. The original legs were wooden but when they proved to be too expensive they were replaced by metal legs. They were very popular ornaments in the 1950s and today, whether fixed in your garden or on your wall as an object of art, they are considered to be part of retro-chic.

One of characteristics of the pink flamingo is that it is hot pink. Lurid colors were popular in the fifties but there was a reaction against plastics and false things in the sixties that made the pink flamingos less popular.

Decorating with them me simple and nowadays they are easy to get through mail order and in stores. If you want an authentic Flamingo buy one that has Don Featherstone’s signature impressed under the tail. A true pink flamingo has a yellow beak with a black tip and authentic flamingo sets are sold in twos. The pair should include one with a long neck and one with a shorter neck. The legs should be wire. If you are buying a single flamingo or one with an orange beak or wooden leg you are not buying the official antique.

When it comes to Pink Flamingos just two will do. However quite a unique effect can be created by decorating your yard with an entire flock of them. You can also put them on your condo or apartment balcony. Pink flamingos also make a humorous statement at the office.

Some people like to dress up their pink Flamingos for the season. They dress them up in Santa Suits and also give them Reindeer Horns.