The Historic District

Thankfully, so many original features have survived in this house. Not the least of which is the swinging door from the kitchen to butlers pantry.
It has been in the attic but now that the attic space has been renovated into living space it's basically homeless.
The previous owner told us that they put it back up for a short time, but is was just in the way so they took it back down. Those owners lived here from 1969 until we bought it in 1998.
The first and seemly most obvious solution is to put it back in it's rightful place. But, to do so would take up a sizeable portion of literally the most busy door opening in the house. It has to stay with the house; I can't hack it up into some trendy "up cycled"craft project; the basement is too prone to mildew to trust it down there.... I just wondered if anyone had any brainstorms...



It's obviously just dusty from our construction. There are matching push plates on both sides. It's a treasure for sure, just not practical for us now.

First I would put it back and see if you agree.... then if you do I would add a door prop to keep it open and out of the way if that is feasibile - shame to lose that beautiful original feature.

Bear in mind that psychologically it takes us about a month to get used to any change so leave it there a good while

I would be tempted to put it back we’re it belongs O2. My other suggestion would be send it to me, third option, just send me the eastlake door pushes.

Gothichome wrote:I would be tempted to put it back we’re it belongs O2. My other suggestion would be send it to me, third option, just send me the eastlake door pushes.

All options are appreciated ! The door push plates are divine! And the pic shows the less attractive side.
One additional complications is that our only functional phone would have to be moved.

When propped open it would sit here:


The old phone is a cabinet where the working phone hides


I appreciate your comments!!

O2, you can move the phone box into the kitchen and cut the land line. We have 1906 Northern Electric mounted in our kitchen, Still has all the guts, turn the crank and it rings, only missing the batteries.
The location of your land line gave me a bit of a smile. When we built our Calgary home we deliberately mounted the phone on the wall in the kitchen, we never placed any thing to sit on with in cord reach. Raising two daughters we thought it best, thier phone conversations were always short if they had to stand and chat on the phone.

I'm surprised at the location of the swinging door. I've only seen them going into a dining room (presumably to quickly cut off diners from the commotion and disarray of the kitchen or pantry). Do you have that option?

I agree with James. The swinging door usually served as a buffer between the dining room and pantry or the kitchen. It would keep those areas out of sight while allowing passage with a slight to moderate push. A handy feature to have is someone was carrying a turkey or a roast into the dining room.

If it won't work there, I'd be tempted to put it back in its original location and see how it works for you. Just because someone else didn't want it there doesn't mean that it was necessarily the best decision. Our kitchen was re-configured in 1969 which resulted in the loss of our back staircase, butler's pantry, and mudroom and resulted in nothing but wasted space. There was also a swinging door that was closed off and the doorway to the dining room was moved to the other end of the wall. Whoever did that renovation was on dope.

That bathroom scale can go - as Ive gotten older, I have permanently banned them from my house

Removal solves two problems at once!

I fixed up an old deco wall phone and it worked until I dropped the phone line. they often have a long cord on the handset.

My kitchen door is like that.. missing! but I cant' see why putting it back would be great... so I guess I'd first decide if you want a door there. sure if it can be left open it would look very nice. easy enough to move the phone. If you dont; want it there I'd just store it..

Great comments and questions!
If I had backed-up just a few more inches on the first picture you could see the door that separates the dining room from the pantry - it is open in the picture, so you are looking through that doorway from the dining room into the pantry. It is a normal door with a lock, latch and knob. It is an interesting and pretty door (ok, so I do have a door fetish, but I think *anyone* would think it's pretty ) in that the pantry side is douglas fir - like the pantry - and the dining room side is ?quarter sawn? oak (don't claim to be an expert in identifying wood types). So I am 100% sure it belongs between the pantry and kitchen.

"That bathroom scale can go - as Ive gotten older, I have permanently banned them from my house "
This cracked me up!! My husband and boys are turkey hunters - the scale is left over from hunting season: they stand on the scale without and then with their turkey to see how much the turkey weighs. I refuse to move it back to where it came from (in the basement) because I didn't put it there... not that anyone else will move it either but I guess it is just a battle of wills (in my own mind, probably no one else even notices!!).

I really am tempted to try it back in the original location... moving the phone will require some creative planning, though, since 90% of the kitchen walls are windows and/or doors. This is literally the only "open" wall space between the 2 rooms. On the opposite side of the phone wall are the back stairs, so the phone would be in the way there too.

I really to appreciate the thoughts and comments - thank you all!