Victorian Kitchens & Baths

by Franklin Schmidt, Esther Schmidt (Photographer)

Romance is in and Victorian design and architecture are as popular now as they were when Victorian was the contemporary style more than a hundred years ago. Often, people who buy a Victorian home have expertise in antiques of the era and can furnish a period living room or bedroom, but they are stymied when it comes to the kitchen and the bathroom. Victorian Kitchens and Baths solves this common dilemma by looking at the individual design, décor and architectural elements that make a room Victorian, offering a myriad of purist as well as interpretive ideas that can be used and adapted to fit many homes and tastes.
Victorian Kitchens & Baths is conveniently divided into four Historic Victorian Kitchens and Baths, What Makes It Victorian, Borrowing Décor from the Parlor, and Contemporary Victorian Bathrooms and Kitchens. Focusing on historical and contemporary elements, Franklin and Esther Schmidt have created a book that appeals to serious aficionados and collectors of Victoriana as well as those who are simply interested in using certain Victorian-style elements in their contemporary homes. Full-color photography, sidebars from professionals, and decorating information accompany a huge range of projects and offer fresh information.
Product experts--and Victorian-era specialists--offer their unique perspectives, tips and ideas, including Erika Kotite, board member of the Victorian Society in America and editor of Victorian Homes magazine; Patty Poore, editor of Old House Interiors; and Florine McCain, editor of Victorian Decorating.
Franklin and Esther Schmidt are a photography, styling, and writing team who have photographed and written about hundreds of homes. Their articles and features have appeared in a variety of magazines, including Architectural Digest, Old House Interiors, Antiques & Fine Art, Country Home and Country Living. As field editors for Victorian Homes, Washington, D.C., correspondents for Art & Antiques, and antiques columnists for Country Accents, they have focused their work on interior design as it relates to architecture and lifestyle. Franklin and Esther are also the authors and photographers of Cabin Kitchens & Baths (Gibbs Smith, 2004). They live in Virginia.

Genres: Reference, Nonfiction

176 pages, Hardcover

First published April 11, 2005

Reviews

[Jacinta Meredith · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent resource to gain understanding of the Victorian way of life as well as interpretation for modern life. Gorgeous pictures and examples.

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a mixed bag. There are some photos of kitchens in house museums, and some nicely done kitchens and baths in private homes, but a good number of the "timeless" designs the authors so proudly show scream 1980s remodel, with distracting granite countertops and weird 80s cabinet finishes that look like no actual wood in nature. Even some of the ones with good bones have Laura Ashley wallpaper and balloon valances (remember those?!), and the staging just made me laugh: loaves of bread jauntily arranged on top of the stove, a pair of teacups on every table, and even a parrot in the kitchen (please tell me this was staged and these people weren't actually doing food prep with a dirty bird around). And so many of the cabinets don't reach to the ceiling!!!

In addition, many of the photos seem unnecessary and unhelpful ("vignette of tub with roses"), and I found the organization lacking. I wish they had done more comprehensive displays of each house (as they did for a few) and called these out clearly in the table of contents. There are a few topical sections, but then other information is scattered throughout and hard to reference, which I think is a consequence of having sections written by different experts. I think what makes this more confusing is the random photos they pair with each of these sections, and the fact that it's not clear from the table of contents whether each section is (1) a home, (2) advice from an expert, or (3) a write-up on a topic by the authors.

I did, however, learn that I have a lot of feelings about modern kitchen cabinets and granite countertops, and they are not positive ones.

NOTES
Open fires until 1880s, then box stove with chambers in 1880s, then smaller wood and coal stove in late 1880s, then gas burners in 1890s, then electric stove in 1910 (p. 34-38)
Edison electric cooking table in 1908 (p. 38)
Running water by late 1880s (p. 40)
Oak mass produced; more exotic woods like birds eye maple and rare African woods were the real luxury. (p. 44)
Bathrooms were status symbols but kitchens were for servants. (p. 68)
Overlay cabinet doors were invented after WWII; all Victorian cabinet doors were flush with their surroundings. Softwood was painted; hardwood was rift- and quartersawn white oak. (p. 70)
Machinery allowed Victorian moldings to be made from hardwood and in middle-class houses. Colonial moldings were softwood and only in fancy houses. (p. 74-75)
Victorian cabinets were "simple with squared, recessed-panel doors"; often painted, didn't run full perimeter of room (p.105)
The best houses had tile in bathrooms; only middle- and lower-class bathrooms had wainscoting. (p. 75)
Lighting styles (p. 89)
1830-1839 Neo-Classical: whale oil and candles
1840-1859 Neo-Classical and Rococo Revival: lard oil and coal gas
1860-1869: Rococo Revival: gas and kerosene
1870-1879: Eastlake and Neo-Grec: gas and kerosene
1880-1889 Aesthetic (Anglo-Japanese): gas, kerosene, electricity
1890-1899 Bent Brass and Pierced Work: gas, kerosene, electricity
Farm kitchens had larder or buttery (named for butts of storage barrels), plus milk room cooled by spring-fed water. (p. 98)
Tin ceilings used in stores, not residential kitchens (p. 106)
Use nickel plumbing, not brass. Three-inch-wide softwood plank flooring, shellacked or stained beadboard (later gloss enamel paint), off-white or yellow walls (no wallpaper unless family cooked themselves). Plain tile around sink and stove only in urban kitchens. Tan or dark green roller shades or muslin curtains with lace panels. (p. 122)

What I learned from looking at cabinets:
Drawers should be flat.
Cabinets should have only a simple recessed panel.
Bottom cabinets should extend lower than modern cabinets. Toe kick ruins verticality.
Doors should have metal handles, not wood knobs.
Wood should have defined grain with medium (not honey) stain or be painted.

Detailed cabinet critiques:
Flat like door looks antique but odd (too many panels?); weird contrast trim (p. 10, 97)
YES Flat with lovely stain; original; inset is sharper edged than modern ones and border thicker (p. 27)
Raised but cover full surface; bottom too beveled (p. 57)
Flat but too rustic (p. 71)
Flat with okay recessed panel but weird raised edge and icky honey oak stain (p. 72)
Flat but too Prairie School and not elegant: honey stain or knobs? (p. 76)
Flat but weird raised edge around recessed panel, panel on drawers, and ugly stain (p. 91)
Raised but cute, maybe because painted, or flat drawers unlike p. 91 (p. 107)
YES Flat, simple raised edging; corner cabinet (p. 113)
YES Flat, simple recessed panel, narrow (p. 117)
Flat but raised edge and no grain and don't extend far enough to floor (p. 118)
YES Flat cabinets, wood counter, old stove (p. 121)
Raised cabinets with border indent look too modern in top photo; with beadboard look okay in bottom; paneled vs. flat drawers, too (p. 123)
Raised, too beveled (p. 130)
Freestanding cupboard with thin but not flat doors (p. 131)
Raised with fun stamped tin inset, wood counter, brick base and backsplash (p. 137)
Raised, too beveled, mass-market top border (p. 142-143)
Raised, simple recessed panel, nice top border (p. 149)
Flat but too beveled (p. 150)
Raised but cover full surface; not terrible but odd decorative cut in drawers, weird beadboard on island, and bad two-tone wood (p. 157)

HISTORIC KITCHENS
Tinker Swiss cottage in Rockford, IL (p. 18)
Charles Ramsey house in St. Paul, MN (p. 51)
Riordan Mansion in Flagstaff, AZ (p. 97)

BEST BATHROOMS
Large wallpaper border with sauna, but 4x4 shower tiles look funny: grout too dark or wide? (p. 13)
4x4 tiles, square mosaic floor, fun deco tub at Wellscroft Lodge near Lake Placid, NY (p. 22)
Gorgeous wood sink console and wallpaper border, great floor (p. 42, 103)

BEST KITCHENS
Gorgeous stove, freestanding cupboards and tables (p. 14)
Center table, refrigerator looks like icebox, original built-in cabinets: Mattauschs in DC (p. 25-29)
Small stove, large freestanding cabinets, center table (p. 67)
Tall Prairie School built-ins with clay tile floor, but more FLW than Victorian (p. 74, 76-77)
Delft tile with blue stone countertop somehow works, no upper cabinets makes up for non-historic lower cabinets, lots of windows in CA (p. 84)
Gorgeous stove and table in CA; want to see more. Is the floor tiny herringbone tile? (p 100)
Green granite island looks fine bc rest is Victorian: wainscoting, freestanding cabinet (p. 114)
Apron sink, flat cabinets, table for island, painted wood floor, cafe curtains over dishwasher? in Peru, IN (p. 117)

DISLIKE
Floral wallpaper clashes with granite counter and tile backsplash. (p. 57)
Marble-painted clawfoot tub on a matching pedestal floor with fake fabric painted on the walls, all in peach and green and gold, in Indiana. Where do I even start with this one? (p. 78)
Granite countertops, cherry cabinet stain, black sink, built-in microwave and bread box, and floral cafe curtains are all so dated. Gorgeous brass faucet looks terrible in here, too. (p. 91)
Square mosaic bathroom floor in kitchen. What a strange choice. (p. 119)
Faux Tuscan everything. Wow, I hate this so much. (p. 150) Caption to bathroom: "If the Victorians had the technical abilities that we have today, surely a well-traveled person of that era would have created just this kind of bathroom" (p. 152). Um, what? We've just been over how skilled Victorian craftsmen were and how new machinery allowed them to produce intricate details in quantities only dreamed of before--but now you're going to try to convince me that a cabinet that looks like it's from Home Goods is the height of modern artistry, which the Victorians could never have achieved?

[Nigel Ewan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mostly embarrassingly bad. Hard to believe this is from 2005; most of the photos feel very early-90s. The two stars I’m giving are for the only parts that aren’t awful: the (very few) photos of authentically old rooms and the two short essays by Brent Hull and Patricia Poore, who alone seem to know what they’re talking about.

[Jennifer Gelert · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have always wanted to restore a Victorian house or even a farmhouse. After reading this book I still do, but am a little scared. I knew, in theory, that there would be a lot of hard work. This book made me realize how much I needed to think about being even starting this endeavor. How to make sure I am period accurate. What makes it period accurate. Do I really want a kitchen or bathroom exactly like the Victorians had. How to incorporate all the modern needs with a classic look.

The pictures were so beautiful. I even saw 2 rooms from the Laura Ingalls Wilder's homestead in South Dakota. That made me so excited.

Some day I want to do this! But for now, I can day dream.

[Erin Caldwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some interesting ideas and beautiful pictures.