I’ve been sitting on these photos for a couple of weeks now and just finally got around to editing them. That being said, this was from a location shoot! The house we were in had such a lovely old oven that spoke of a different time in which all ascetics could be traced back to cars.
I love the product design of that now lost era. It’s awesome just by the fact that though everyone would stare at the beauty of your oven’s badge, no one would second guess its being there.
As you pull out from the initial trance the badge has held you in for so many moments you begin to see a device that is not only very pleasing to the eye, but built with extreme purpose. And that purpose was to feed the nuclear family. The left oven has one low rack and only one other spot to move that rack in case you have a smaller roast because the kids are eating at the neighbors. The right oven has a number of racks so that you may prepare all of your side dishes at the same time in a timely manner.
The gas stove protecting from the high cost and lack of reliability of an electric one. (Electric stoves were slow to catch on, especially in rural areas due to the high cost of electricity. The patent however, was granted in 1897, at least one with a dial.)
If you’re in need of more counter space, then the green back moves down to cover all of the burners, both child proofing and providing that extra counter space that you need.
Finally, for convenient storage, there are to pull out drawers beneath the respective ovens to keep those pans close at hand!
They even thought to include a little tick mark for every other minute on the inside of the larger numbers so you could make your dinner a perfect golden brown! I think that an oven like this provides more of a definition of what the 50’s – early 60’s design and family life in America than just about any other object.
On from the design itself, the brilliant white plastics have long since yellowed from all the meals made within. Over the years they become stains that won’t come out with any amount of scrubbing, just adding to the over all mystique of the thing.
I think that it’s always interesting how much history an object like an oven can have when given the attention that it so rarely receives. This is true not just for ovens, but for just about any object, especially those of antiquity. What a neat place we live in. If you made it this far, thanks for reading though my babble or quickly scrolling though the pictures and catching the last sentence!
Well done post. fascinating subject.
I’d LOVE to have a stove/oven like that! Thanks for sharing! It’s so true that you can tell a lot about society and the way we live by examining the things we use and how we use them.
That’s my dream stove.
love the photography! and the story!
I love history and anything that carries plenty of that with it. 🙂 Loved the images of the oven. It seems that the owner is still using it? How cool is that!
Yea, they were! Most of their house was made up of neat things like the oven, but unfortunately we had to move onto the next location fairly quickly.
i have that stove in white! it’s absolutely fantastic
your macro shots are stunning.
Your fascination for this stuff is so adorable 😀 😛 But once again you show me something cool I might have ignored!
this old-and-wierd-haunted-and-rustic-stuff is what i ment by “this stuff” I guess, but I mean it in the best way 😉
🙂 🙂 🙂
What a great oven! Love the post!
Excellent Information. thanks a lot!
Great post and some really nice photos. You have a great, eclectic blog.
I would love to have one of those revamped modern versions one day. But man, those are expensive!
I know someone with an old oven like that and it never breaks! I swear, things in the olden days were just manufactured better 🙂
Oven photo brings back memories. I was a little kid when those were in vogue. Thanks for the like of my post “What January is Supposed to Look Like.”
Thanks for liking a post on my blog. That stove is amazing. Wish I had one with such history.
Great post, very interesting, and wonderful photos. I love that oven, wow. Many years ago I had an apartment in an old, urban brick apartment building in Hoboken, NJ – across the river from NYC. There was no central heat in that building – none. The oven provided the heat – it was an old gas oven with a big element burner on one side (and regular burners for cooking on the other side). You took the cast iron plates off, lit the element, and the hot air shot up to the ceiling and stayed there. We set up a fan to move heat into the bedroom. The oven was white enamel (I wish I had a photo) and it had one of those simple lever things you use with wood stoves to take the hot plate off the top. I hope this is semi clear!
Thanks for sharing the story! It’s very clear and paints a wonderful picture. 🙂 Hope you’re having a great day!