Old fashioned kitchen

Have enjoyed the old-fashioned kitchen ideas. How about old fashioned ideas for the rest of the house?
I always liked the idea of tubes in the walls for room to room speaking. Don't know the proper name for them.
Also a definite mudroom.

R. they were called 'speaking tubes'! LOL Sometimes called 'blowers' because some had a whistle built in that you would blow into first to get the attn of the person at the other end.

__________________
I believe in God's willingness to heal.

Cyngbaeld's Keep Heritage Farm, breeding a variety of historical birds and LaMancha goats. (It is pronounced King Bold.)

Nice pictures everybody. I love the Tipi.

My "dream kitchen" would include a hand water pump, walk-in fireplace/hearth complete with cooking cauldren and built in baking wall and curtains on the cabinets instead of doors. I'd also love a scullery.

But I'm funny that way.

donsgal

__________________
Life is what happens while you are making other plans. (John Lennon)

Ford8N: Nice pictures of your re-do.
Steve in Ohio: Nice job.
Sheepish: Looks great.
Muller's Lane Farm: Nice big kitchen.

Aintlifegrand: sorry, I just noticed your question. Yes, I love the soapstone for working. I don't need to worry about damaging the counters with acids, bases or oils. They do a great job of quick thawing frozen foods and are also not damaged by setting extremely hot pots or baking stones on them.

Our soapstone has an "orange peel" finish, so it holds a lot of water before any runs off, up to a cup on a 2 foot square. I really like that feature.

They are nice to lean on on a hot summer day.

The one disadvantage of the soapstone sink is also a big advantage. The soapstone is a major heat sink, so when I fill it with hot water, it sucks out the heat quickly. I have learned to add a kettle of boiling water, if I am not washing up quickly. However, once the stone is hot, the sink and water stay hot for a long time.

I just remembered my aunt's kitchen. She had a hand water pump in her kitchen. As a child I was always fascinated by that thing. I had never and have never since seen one in a kitchen. I realize now that it was probably not connected to a well, but to a cistern.
Yes, I would definitely want that in a kitchen as well.
As far as a scullery - a kitchen all tiled floor and ceiling would make clean up easy. Kitchens in South America are tiled that way.

You have read my mind I have been trying to figure ways to combine some of the modern conveniences with an more old fashioned kitchen.
I started approaching DH about building the kitchen furniture that I dream of instead of cabinets for our future house on our land.
I love the look of pie safes, jelly cupboards, hoosier cabinets...........but DH likes modern appliances. He is a good carpenter so I am hoping that he will build the furniture that I would prefer.
Of course there would need to be a walk in pantry off the kitchen and some kind of root cellar room off of that (water table is high so a basement is out of the question).

My mind is already wandering through the possibilities.

Bev

I like the stone floors, too, or brick or tile.

A big walk-in pantry, and an adjacent (on the same level, more or less) root cellar.

A wood cook stove, AND a big colonial-style Rumford fireplace with the cooking crane and brick oven (they didn't build huge roaring fires in them, just small cooking fires usually, so they don't send as much of your heat up the chimney as you'd think). A smoking chamber above the fireplace, for smoked meats.

A work island at table height, or a big, sturdy wooden table in the middle of the kitchen.

Some copper pans hanging up above the fireplace, just because they are pretty.

A big bay window with shelves for plants -- geraniums in bloom!

A couple of easy chairs near the fireplace, with a work table and sewing basket between them.

Space for a spinning wheel and a loom.

A big double sink with integral drain boards.

A place in the pantry where the big meat grinder and the grain mill can be permanently mounted.

A summer kitchen just outside the regular kitchen, and from the summer kitchen just one step to the kitchen garden.

A hand pump either in the kitchen, or just adjacent to it in the mud-room.

Not historical, but I'd build into the south wall both a solar cooker and a solar food dryer. Into a north wall, I would build a 'cool box', a non-electric naturally cooled refrigerator.

A mud room with plenty of ROOM for boots and coats; a chest of drawers for hats, mittens, and such; a boot jack; someplace to set buckets and water jugs; storage for the egg basket and whatever I'm using to carry milk containers back and forth; flashlights, lamps, and other miscellaneous items that are sometimes needed indoors, and other times needed outdoors. Oh, and a place to clean the dogs' feet off before letting them into the rest of the house. Slippers to change into when coming back into the house. Pegs for hanging up leashes and lead ropes.

Could think of lots more given time, but it's getting late!

Kathleen

I've always loved those hoosier cabinets--all those little spaces and nooks! I hope I can have one in that new kitchen we might do someday, instead of some cabinets.

I really like that old worn butcher block, I love stuff like that that has seen a lot of whacking. I do have a "farm" table where I roll out pie dough and pastry, do bread. I'd like to have a nice slab of wierd granite for that.

I do love the natural materials and efficient space and simplicity of old kitchens. I clean a lot of mcmansion kitchens--most are never cooked in, all have acres of unused countertops(or worse, covered with junk), and all these cuboards for what? I said it in another thread, but I always loved the description of the kitchen and pantry Almanzo built for Laura Ingalls(and she burnt it down ). Such a guy to think about what works for a cook

__________________
THE BEGINNING IS NEAR
5-star double-rated astronavagatrix earth girl

Now that's the dream kitchen. I love those rumford Fireplaces. Curious about the smoker for meats...would that be part of the rumford fireplace?

__________________
Christanie Farm...living life as it was intended

Here is a Rumford designed Fireplace, it has a crane for cooking that we still use.This was the original kitchen in this house

__________________
Life is simpler when you plow around the stumps

OHohOHOH! How wonderful. What kind of things do you cook with it?

Here is the one in Williamsburg again

__________________
Thinking is hard. Feeling and believing a storyline is easy.

FREEEEEEEDDDDDDDOOOOOOMMM!!!

Prof Kingsfield. Rules!!





http://tnwoodwright.blogspot.com/

Oh please keep this thread going I am learning so much and getting so many ideas - I am burning the midnight oil researching sources online!

All the pictures are great - I am green with envy.

Bev

To SHEEPISH.......
Your kitchen is ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL !!!

Give me your address....I'll send someone to STEAL your "butcher-block" cutting table!!

Ha-Ha!......just kidding about "stealing"!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Bruce (in New Mexico) (who has an "old-fashioned" kitchen, also. with Lots of Cast-Iron Cookware.)