Kitchen Colours and guest blogger Cathy Negus

Most of my backgrounds are now roughed out and I've just decided on the colours for the kitchen! Weeee! Check out my colour choices:What do you think? There were a few versions before this one. Yellow is meant to be predominant but I had versions with far more pink or green. Pink is a colour Birdie likes and green to reiterate the theme of pickles. There's still some of both of those now but much more yellows and brown/tan/beige. It's hideously adorable I think.

I figure that the stove is often a very central piece to the existence of a homemaker. Certainly in the 50's. Green is a colour that needs to selectively pop up in the film. So making the stove green seemed natural. When I first dropped green over the stove, a long lost memory from my childhood surfaced... My family used to have a hideous/amazing green stove!! I had completely forgotten. It was a cheap 70's model. After remembering this I rang my mum and asked her about it. It is too vivid a memory for her to forget. I asked her to write a blurb about that old stove for my blog. So here it is, written by my first guest blogger; Cathy Negus! p.s. please check out her delicious blog Chez Catherine!

“Avocado Green”, by Catherine Negus

“Avocado Green.” How the appliance companies chose that colour description for the once popular appliance colour, I’ll never know. The colour was unlike any avocado I’ve ever seen. The actual colour was a darker, yellowy greenish colour which seems to defy specific description and which, to me, was always sadly unappealing. And yet, I was once the owner, albeit reluctant, of an “Avocado Green” stove. Now many years ago, it had belonged to my then husband at the time we married and was with me for too many years. Not only was it “Avocado Green”, it had been a “scratch and dent special”, with a bottom storage door that was dented and always hung at an odd angle, probably a result of being dropped off the back of the transport truck it was first delivered in. It was never much in the baking department, either. Part way through baking, I always had to rush to the oven to turn my pie or cake in order to get reasonably even baking results. Even that didn’t help entirely, and cakes tended to look strangely lopsided and pies were always more well done on one side.

Unlike so many, who look back on their first-ever stove with wistful nostalgia; who were heartbroken to see the old dear finally go and only after it has become ancient and broken beyond repair, I couldn’t have been happier to see the last day of my “Avocado Green” stove. Overjoyed, I moved on to a neutral toned gas range that was easier on the eyes and performed much better in the baking department. I know there is a current movement towards the “retro” appliance colours of the past, but I believe that there are some things should be left forever in the past. “Avocado Green”, once best friends with “Harvest Gold” in appliance departments throughout North America, died a long, slow, painful death. I say, let it rest in peace, never to grace the front of an appliance again. Believe me, it’ll be good thing for all of us.

*Final Note: I do have a suggestion as a description of the colour of that stove... Cat vomit! I can also say that I adore beautiful retro style! If one does find an appealing vintage appliance, it it certainly possible to gut and fit with new inner workings so as to be a better pie baker. There are also some handsome reproduction or 'retro inspired' appliances on the market these days. Just a few:

Check out the great line up of appliances at Big Chill. (*Note that Big Chill advertises their 2007 "Colour of the Year": "Spring Avocado!!!!)

Retro Planet has a lot of fantastic retro items including diner style booths, barstools, chairs and tables!
Heartland has some very vintage inspired appliances!