Here’s a modern living-dining area with hanging buffet table, and all the upholstery and curtaining is from Donald Brothers, the furniture by Gordon Andrews, and the painting by Frank Hodgkinson. The photograph itself was taken by Max Dupain. All those names together, that’s impressive!

In this room, the desk and goat’s head sculpture are by Gordon Andrews, the chairs by Bill Lucas, the table by Mathieu Mategot, and the painting by Rachel Roxburgh.

A cottage renovation by interior designer Marion Hall Best, ‘one of Australia’s most important and influential 20th century interior designers’. Sofas and coffee table made by E. A. Moulen, iron chair by Bill Lucas, more Donald Brothers upholstery, the mural on the wall by Dora Sweetapple (Hall Best’s sister), and the paintings by Michael Kmit.

Information on the designers here seems to be missing. I love the purple sofa and chairs.

Danish style modernist chair and sideboard/buffet. And that deep deep turquoise carpet. I don’t think it’s Feltex this time.

Kitchen advertisement for Tygan wallpapers. This is one … interesting … kitchen. Tartan wallpaper! Speckled lino floor! Dark green cupboards! Troughton and Young modernist light fittings! Floral curtains! It’s like a little bit of every style popular in the 50s all in the one room.

This is an ad for one of the Staffordshire pottery studios. I can’t recall which one. Casual dining for the well-off in 1958. They’ll come in from a game of tennis any second now.

Advertisement for Vynex upholstery. Vinyl-coated chairs aren’t very nice in the Australian summer. Those women are actually stuck to the chairs.

Herre’s a sitting room with the ever-popular Venetian blinds, in red; barkcloth curtains; Fler or Snelling style chairs, sofa and desk; Feltex carpet, and what might be an Albert Namatjira watercolour print on the wall.

A bedroom, with the very popular skirted bedspread; teak bed head; more of that deep green Feltex; and another Fler or Snelling type chair.

What’s that on the floor? Why, it’s more dark green Feltex! That stuff was everywhere. Some more of those chairs too, and a matching coffee table on what looks like a chenille rug. Seems it was fairly popular to have a mix of modern and antique style furniture and homewares, there are lots of pictures in my vintage home magazines of rooms like this. Is that a Renoir print hanging on the wall?

Tiki time! Cane furniture with a bamboo or palm frond print upholstery,  yellow Venetians and ceiling with dark turquoise walls. I like the rug, and I love the ‘crazy paving’ fireplace.

Found at Salvos in Fyshwick, a Danish-style mid-century modern chest of drawers. It’s got solid teak trim and handles, and an unusual plywood veneer. One of the drawers is stamped inside with “Gainsborough” and the company address in Melbourne. Needs a bit of cleaning up, but it’s still very nice! I put some felt under the TV so it won’t cause any damage. The little vase on the left was a Trash and Treasure find – the lady I bought it from reckoned it was an unmarked Diana factory second (there’s a little bit of the glaze missing). Either way, it’s pretty.

I also got these excellent dishes:

One was from Vinnies in Dickson, and the other from Vinnies in Queanbeyan. Nice weighty ceramic, signed “CT” on the bottom. I’m not really a pottery/ceramics person, so I have no idea who CT could be. If anyone knows, please tell! There are pictures of dishes like these in some of my mid-50s home decorating magazines. They’re in great condition, they look like they’ve sat in somebody’s display unit for the past 40,50, 60? years.

Knitting pattern – 3.5mb PDF

Those harps are only about 155cm/5′ tall and quite light. Over the years, harps got bigger and more complicated to play, it was more difficult for a young lady to become accomplished, and so the piano soon took pride of place in the parlour. Harps remained quite ornamented, but change came. First, there was the art deco styling of the Lyon and  Healy Salzedo model, introduced in 1928, designed by Witold Gordon in collaboration with the great harpist Carlos Salzedo.

And then, in 1957, this harp by German harpmakers Thurau, won a prize at the Trienniale di Milano. It was designed by Rainer Schütze, who was schooled in the Bauhaus way:

And Lyon & Healy introduced this harp, the Style 30, in 1958:

And not modernist, but you could say it’s either an interesting break with tradition, or it’s really going back to the idea of the harp as decorative sculpture; the Scolpita by Italian harpmakers Salvi:

Of course this post is just about how the harps look. If you want to know more about pedal harp construction and how they work, there’s a good introductory article at Harp Spectrum. Folk/Celtic/lever harps have their own story which I may do a post about later! And if you’re looking for harps and harp accessories, music, lessons, etc in Canberra? Head to the Harp Centre.

A March 1955 special feature on Canberra. Canberra was a relatively new city, and after WWII, modern architecture sprang up everywhere alongside the original Californian bungalows and (almost Arts and Crafts) cottages. There are many excellent examples, and the best place to read about them is the Canberra House blog. One of these excellent houses is actually up for sale: an Alex Jelinek house at 10 Gawler St, Deakin. It comes with its custom made Krimper furniture! Price is ‘by negotiation’. Canberra prices are pretty outrageous even for ordinary houses, but if I was the kind of person who had a lot of money to spend on a house, I’d be up for this one. Looking at the pictures, I wonder if those are the original bathrooms. The fittings look kind of 1978 and out-of-place.

Anyway, the Home Beautiful feature has sections on public architecture, such as at ANU; private homes, including floor plans and interiors; and local craftspeople making pottery and furniture. I’ve put it all into a PDF for download, it’s 30MB: Home Beautiful Goes to Canberra – March 1955.

It’s a Leach-Way catalogue, a British company that seems to have been making patterns from the 1930s. You can find them now and then on eBay. All these patterns are for bust size 40″ to 50″, about a 14-24 in today’s clothing sizes. And they are about 5281% more flattering and lovely than nearly everything on offer in the plus-size market today, even in modern pattern catalogues. There are plenty of dresses, with complementary suits, blouses, skirts and coats. If you’re handy with patterns it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out how to construct them, especially if you have a few vintage patterns already. You can always trace and scale up a vintage pattern, too. Here’s a very useful tutorial: How to re-size a pattern.

I’ve put the whole catalogue into a PDF, it’s 27MB. A few pages are a little blurry on one corner or tilted off-center – sorry about that, but the disintegrating condition of the catalogue made it hard to scan properly. Download it here: Leach-Way Outsize pattern catalogue.

I made two batches last weekend, as you can see in the photo. The pink one is flavoured with vanilla and rosewater, and the green with lime zest and vanilla. There are several ways of making it: with a cooked milk mix; with condensed milk; with a boiled, kneaded fondant; and with Copha.

I used a variation on the Women’s Weekly coconut ice recipe and it created a nice fudgy texture. I don’t like the waxy texture of things with Copha!

Harp Lounge Coconut Ice

1. Line a 20cm square cake tin with two sheets of baking paper, crosswise, and long enough so that plenty overhangs the edge.
2. Sift the icing sugar (or at least make sure it has no big hard lumps) into a large mixing bowl, then stir in everything else except the food colouring. Mix until well combined – it should be quite dense. Add more coconut if you think it needs it.
3. Halve the mixture into two bowls, add the colouring to one and stir through evenly.
4. Press the white mixture firmly into the lined tin, and then the coloured mixture on top of that. Refrigerate for at least 24 hours to set.
5. Remove set mixture from the tin by lifting out with the baking paper. Slice into small squares with a sharp knife. (Should make 36-64 depending on how big you slice them.) You can refrigerate the cut squares to set them further, especially if the weather or your fridge is humid.

Eat deliciousness.

Here’s an ad for Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, date early-mid 1940s, I think, going by the pageboy hairstyle. A time when beer ads featured classy lassies wearing more than a bikini! (Artist placed the lady sitting way too far down the harp, incidentally. And sitting on the wrong side of it! Sorry, that’s my musician pedantry at work. )

Not sure exactly what this one’s about, but possibly hand lotion, as the copy reads “Reason for calluses on slim hands – harp playing”. Again sometime in the 1940s, and this time she’s on the correct side of the harp and at the right height!

Here’s one for Bufferin for arthritis! 1950s.

And lastly for today, the harp being used for its connotations of elegance in this ad for wallpaper and furnishing fabric by Sanderson of England (click to embiggen). This was from a 1952 Australian House and Garden magazine.