Comments on: "An ultra-urban island of individuality in a sea of look-alike dwellings"

"An ultra-urban island of individuality in a sea of look-alike dwellings"

Chrischris — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 18:42:33 -0800

The Playboy Townhouse. Posh Plans for Exciting Urban Living, circa 1961. via

By: jonson

jonson — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 18:59:50 -0800

Excellent, thanks!

By: frogan

frogan — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:05:58 -0800

I'd live there.

By: pwedza

pwedza — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:08:29 -0800

There are a couple of places (hmm, I just mistyped "palaces") that look like this in DC. Definately a city that is a "sea of look-alike dwellings." Sad thing is, one could probably have afforded all three levels of this Playboy Townhouse in 1961 what we pay for two rooms today!!

By: HuronBob

HuronBob — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:20:49 -0800

Actually, 1962...May to be exact... the cover is located here The cover says it all....that gloved hand reaching for the knocker...we all know what happens next.... build it and they will come... (resisting the urge to spell that last word in a more porn oriented manner). I can remember standing in the drugstore, stealing peeks at Playboy in 1962. The stuff that adolescent dreams are made of..

By: kimota

kimota — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:23:41 -0800

Thanks, Chrischris! I love midcentury modern design, and this place looks like Tony Stark's bachelor pad! Also, your via link led me to this, which I thought was cool as hell!

By: maxwelton

maxwelton — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:29:08 -0800

I have an E-Type, so does that mean I'm halfway there? I'd live there, too, though I often find my feelings mixed about the contrast of an ultra-contemporary facade in a street of otherwise period buildings. Some days I love it, other days I feel it is terribly insensitive and crass. Love the manly display of weapons over the desk. Also, lots of "wasted" space. It looks like at least 1/3rd (maybe closer to 1/2) of the house is used simply to get from one part of it to another. Cool link!

By: BoringPostcards

BoringPostcards — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:48:59 -0800

This is where Mr. Incredible lived before he married Elasti-Girl.

By: smallerdemon

smallerdemon — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 19:55:37 -0800

Later you have to convert the den into a nursery. Oh, sorry, after you've converted it into a dungeon for spanking for a few years first. Sweet. I love it. :) Thanks.

By: liquorice

liquorice — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 20:07:45 -0800

Bah, I'd live there and I'm a playgirl. Also...a rotating bed? Man, that'd be fun.

By: beaucoupkevin

beaucoupkevin — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 21:04:30 -0800

I love midcentury modern design, and this place looks like Tony Stark's bachelor pad! I thought of Reed and Sue Richards myself, with a lot of Kirbytech buried in the walls.

By: tula

tula — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 21:32:32 -0800

I was thinking it looked like Dr. Venture's pad.

By: doctor_negative

doctor_negative — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 22:31:21 -0800

I guessed before looking that there would be a round be, but I didn't guess that it would have a built in wet bar. They really were the cocktail generation. It's interesting to note what isn't there; no computer, no giant TV or stereo. Nothing to do but talk to your current conquest and drink yourself into oblivion.

By: doctor_negative

doctor_negative — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 22:32:01 -0800

er, round bed, that is

By: fenriq

fenriq — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 23:56:34 -0800

Looks like a place Austin Powers could call home.

By: cenoxo

cenoxo — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 00:47:47 -0800

Nice gouache and ink renderings by Humen Tan. Dig that $55 Don Richards polyester-wool-mohair suit [bottom right, p. 105] too. Yeah, Baby!

By: imperium

imperium — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 01:24:18 -0800

Hey, $1450 is still too much to pay for a sofa. And *pffft!*, I got the magic of Airport Express. OK, yes, I'm jealous.

By: password

password — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 05:19:01 -0800

Looks like this is where the Cohen brothers went for inspiration when they picked the set for Jackie Treehorn's Bachelor pad.

By: jfuller

jfuller — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 06:08:32 -0800

> I have an E-Type, so does that mean I'm halfway there? A restored (or never-deteriorated) XKE is a fantastic ride now, after four-plus decades of attrition, and we're appropriately jealous. At the time, though, it was a middle-rank sports car, up from Corvette but not in the top-end group. Looking at the renderings, I did wonder why they chose to give their price-is-no-object swinger a Jag when it doesn't cost any more to paint a picture of a DB4 or a 300SL or a street-legal Testa Rossa. There's a reason the Connery Bond drove an Aston. Oh, and doesn't it say it's a two-car garage? We have to assume the help is out in the Bentley picking up some fraises du bois.

By: bashos_frog

bashos_frog — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 06:27:08 -0800

I miss illustrations in magazines. I guess photography is just too easy nowadays.

By: biscotti

biscotti — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 06:56:29 -0800

Fantastic. I'd live there in a second. What a great era, I love the idea that there's a "minimum number of servants" that's more than 0.

By: cenoxo

cenoxo — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 08:50:11 -0800

I miss illustrations in magazines. I guess photography is just too easy nowadays. A long lament, shared by many. From What is "Illustration" and Why does it Irritate the Intelligentsia So?:

So if illustrators were good enough for museums at one time, when did they become unfit? As with most good things, it ended in the 1960s, though the decline started before that. After WWII, illustration was replaced more and more by photography. By the 1960s, illustration was seen as passé and color photography which was new, more immediate, and let's face it, cheaper, took its place. What few illustrators were still around were getting out of the business because business wasn't very good. By the early 1960s, you could buy The Saturday Evening Post and find only one illustration: the cover; all story art was gone. ... I suspect illustration art will return to popularity one day as the cycle of photos and non-art for art's sake will run it's course. In the meanwhile, I pity the poo-pooing art elite in the media, academia, and elsewhere. I really do. I can appreciate Herbert Paus as much as I can Jackson Pollock. The elites can't. At least they can't openly without a whiff of irony or a hint of condescension. Just remember that before Warhol made Campbell's soup cans into his own brand of art, others were doing it on a daily basis, just to sell the soup.

Agreed: we need to get back to The Future (Herbert Paus, 1932).

By: Relay

Relay — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 10:06:44 -0800

It's money baby!

By: spacely_sprocket

spacely_sprocket — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 11:34:06 -0800

Very cool. For mid-century modern, that mediterranean sideboard is horrible. This would be better, IMHO. Also noted: All that space and no bathroom. Perhaps if one is that posh, one doesn't do that. Or maybe you just have your servant do it for you.

By: Chrischris

Chrischris — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 16:11:18 -0800

Tulip chair by Laverne originals: $240.00 Latest ebay Auction estimate for a pair of the same chairs: $10,000-15,000. Much as I love the look of mid-century (especially the Case Study Houses) architecture and design, it seems important to remember that, by and large, the items we consider iconic were machine-built, mass-produced, and--truth be told--not particularily well constructed.

By: Spatch

Spatch — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 16:44:03 -0800

So that's what one of them articles looks like. I am seriously fascinated with the cross-section drawing cause like many kids, I used to draw my super awesome dream house and never once did I think of putting in an amazing rotating bed. The built-in telephone, hi-fi and wet bar must have been Hef's idea, and we all know how several hours of balladry will really woo your lady fair while you spin right round like a record, baby. But where can you find modernist circular blankets?