Friday, November 7, 2008

Seemed like a good idea at the time.........

Driving by a house one day in town, I saw a cabinet at the end of someone's driveway and pulled the truck around to take a closer look. It was a Hoosier cabinet! A Hoosier was a cupboard built in the early 1900's. Houses of that period were not equipped with built-in cabinetry, and the lack of storage space in the kitchen was a problem. The cabinet had three basic parts- the bottom consisting of compartments and/or drawers, the top which was not as deep and had shelves and in the middle where the top and bottom were joined was a slide out counter, sometimes with narrow drawers or a cutting board. The coolest part, was that the top usually had a combination flour-bin/sifter, a tin hopper that could be used without having to remove it from the cabinet.

They were many different styles made over the years. My grandmother had one. I remember hers had a flour sifter and a bin for flour that didin't pull out like a drawer, but rather tipped out so you could scoop out your flour as needed. Hers has an enamel pull out counter and was much older than this one. The one I have is not one of the old models, but it's still really cool.

Needless to say, as soon as I saw this one, I knew I had to have it. It cost me $50. Lucky for me, I was driving the truck that day and we were able to fit it into the back. Now I am in the process of stripping it so I can get it into the house before the winter hits. I have only ever stripped one other piece of furniture and now I remember why.......I hate doing it! It is an AWFUL job! And very slow, and I don't know why I thought I wanted to do this...But after 2 days I am much closer to be done- the outside of it anyway. The inside will have to wait until another time (ie: it will stay the way it is) And I do LOVE this cabinet and have the spot picked out where it will go. (oh by the way, anyone looking for a FREE piano?!) Here's some photos taken just as I started stripping it and a few in the middle of the mess. I hope to someday have "after" shots to post as well...

1 comment:

Lee said...

Looks awesome Kathy it will be great when its finished!! I have a dresser from my mom years ago that she had as a child and I had someone strip it for me..I was pregnant at the time...so nice to say goodbye to it and have it brought back stripped!!