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Roaring 20's Architecture
by Dr. Oneida Cramer

Cheryl and Donald Hoogland fell madly in love with 1920?s architecture. But it took longer for Cheryl to embrace the old fashioned interiors popular in those days. Then, turning to her education in interior design and an inbred resourcefulness from her mother, Cheryl and her husband created an interior ambience attune with the times of their Tudor cottage. And this year, they opened this home to the public during a spring home tour.

Almost serendipitously, the couple first saw the home on a tour before they married. Cheryl remembers tucking the home?s graphic by her bed in the first few months of marriage and then tucking the whole idea in the back of her brain, where she gave up on it, like little dreams let fly by the wayside. However, one day while driving around on a home searching mission, she and Donny spotted the house, once again, only this time abandoned and bearing a For Sale sign in the front yard.

?When we walked into the house, the funniest part of it is we brought my mother and my husband brought his best man,? Cheryl said. ?And everyone who saw the house went---?Are you really sure you want to endeavor in this thing.? Insulation poured out a hole in the sheet rock, where someone had stepped through the ceiling. And a hot water heater took up much of one kitchen corner. But, when Cheryl and Donny saw the house, they both agreed?they wanted it.

?We had looked around and admired some re-dos that we felt were really done well?that kept the character,? Cheryl said. ?We wanted to add our own flair.?

?We took possession of the house October 27th,? said Cheryl. ?And it was really strange because here was our fist house, and we?d never signed our names so many times in our life. And then all of a sudden, next thing we knew, we were taking a sledgehammer to the kitchen.?

?We did all the demolition ourselves on the kitchen cause we knew we had this vision for what we wanted,? Cheryl said. ?And we had a finite amount of money to do it. So, we had to do it on a budget. But our thing was to keep it authentic to the character to what it had originally been intended.?

Determined to move in by Christmas Eve left less than two months for reconstruction, which involved gutting the kitchen, removing all latex paint, and taking up the floors. They relocated the water heater to the attic and rebuilt all-new cabinetry, sink, stove, wood flooring, and a stationary work island. Using the archway between the living room and dining as a template, they opened up an arch between the breakfast nook and kitchen by knocking out the wall, which by the way held an ironing board that they relocated on another wall. Yet, they were able to leave intact the wall-storage hot-iron plate.

In other parts of the house, they retiled the front entry and reworked the fireplace with slate. And just as they were finishing up the job and had spent the last of their budget, there came a big surprise. While changing out the toilet in the only bathroom, they found the sub floor mushy when, suddenly, the entire bottom caved in. Fortunately, to the rescue came parents and friends who ripped out the floor and a carpenter who rebuilt an entire new floor, another person to put in all new tiles, and someone to re-porcelain the bath and sink?a total bath remodeling project completed in a week.

Most homes built during the early part of the century have only one bath, says Cheryl. The Hooglands had considered a second bath by converting the master dressing room. Instead, they decided to keep the window seat, the cedar trunk, and the built-in vanity and live with one bathroom.

So, Christmas Eve found them in overalls painting the wall, when in trotted parents and grandparents with Brie, pate, and champagne for a celebration.

?Between friends and family, we got through, which was wonderful,? said Cheryl. ?But it didn?t leave much for decorating. We were just newlyweds bringing ourselves together. And we had these grandiose ideas because my background was Knoll and my husband was an architectural developer. We had this vision to want everything to be sleek and contemporary. ?

? I can remember my mother saying you?re going to have to be resourceful here,? Cheryl said. Then, a friend began to tell her when designers were getting rid of extra yards of material.

?The very first one (sale) we went to, I remember going on a Saturday morning with coffee in our hands,? Cheryl said. ?There was this warehouse, and they opened the garage door. And all the bolts of fabric were $1.00 here and $.50 here?chintz and English floral, and things I wasn?t into at the time. I can remember calling my mother and saying??I just bought it.? Only Cheryl put everything in the closet, where it sat for a long time while she hoped for a different look. Then one day, Cheryl decided her mother was right?she did want to have her house looking presentable.

?Well, that began this love of being resourceful and love of estate sales, and garage sales,? said Cheryl. ?Everything that we had done, we did on a shoestring budget, which was annoying at first. Then it became?our careers caught up with us and we finally could afford?we didn?t want to anymore because the hunt was so fun. That?s our hobby together.?

?Pretty much, everything is from garage sales,? said Cheryl. ?If it?s hanging from a curtain rod, I sewed it.? Three chandeliers, one in the dining room, one in the hall, and one in the living room came from one box in the back of a garage?the owner took ten dollars. Yet, putting it all together?the pictures on the wall, the bric-a-brac and layers of photos, the period furniture?is an unmistakable opulence harking back to a pre-depression era, only updated with modern conveniences. For instance, the old mud room between the backdoor entrance and the kitchen houses the washer and dryer behind closet doors. And recessed down lighting provides an ambience conducive to two who love to cook in well-equipped kitchen and a stereo system runs throughout the house, a project completed when Cheryl was out of town.

The outdoor awning provides one of two elements popular in the 1920?s that people forget to put back after they deteriorate (the other is shutters), according to Cheryl. ?That was something we wanted to do because we thought they were attractive?like putting a scarf on to go with an outfit.?






-by Dr. Oneida Cramer
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