sneaking into abandoned mid century homes
Today I am heading out with Rochelle to explore some retro abandoned homes this is the coolest kitchen i think i've ever seen someone really made these choices and all seriousness was like yes yeah oh it does what why are they still paying the power bill for this house and thanks so much to wafer for sponsoring a portion of this video okay we are in the car i'm with Rochelle and we're gonna go and check out some houses today i'm so excited hold on hold on we need a story time hi my name is becky and i absolutely love retro interior design spanning all the way back from the Usonian homes of the 1930s to the mid-century architecture of the 1950s to the space age concept designs of the 1970s anything just like wild out there i can't believe we were making spaces like that and we don't anymore if it fits in that category i could gush about this all day i love it there are some amazing home tours of these homes that still exist in their original state on youtube and you bet i have seen them our story starts a couple of years ago when i stumbled on one of these home tours this house is unlike anything you have ever seen before it is just every inch of it is wild and amazing and when i first saw it didn't pay too much attention to where it was assumed it was likely in the states and i would never be able to see it in real life fast forward a few years later i am now active on tick tock and i see a tick tock of this exact same house come up on my for you page and like once you see this house you don't forget this house this was very clearly the same house so i think huh who is this guy touring these homes where does he live how does he have access to these homes so i shoot him a message out of the blue like honestly not really hoping for a response well hoping but not expecting i get a response not only are these homes within my own country of canada they are within driving distance and he can take me to see them next week in real life so that brings us today i am heading out with rochelle to meet ethan irl to explore some retro abandoned homes i didn't think that sentence would be coming out of my mouth when i saw that video two years ago wow you are in for a treat i really don't know what to expect at all like i've i've seen some of these in video but i feel like seeing it in real life is just going to be like i don't know so much crazier so see you when we get there okay we're driving through a very nice neighborhood what's that TikTok it's like the woman was speechless right now and we're just saying like i can't believe there's like an empty abandoned house in the middle of all this like you would never know i'm worried this video is going to be uninteresting now because i think i will actually be speechless the whole time i'm just going to be like okay all right it's time to meet ethan and hear about our first home spoiler we are going to more than one today so this house was custom built in 1967 and no one's currently living in it and it's pretty untouched yep for the most part cool okay i'm excited to see let's go watch your step walking into this house was just the most amount of i don't know where to look because every wall is something amazing wallpaper on wallpaper on a wallpaper oh my god i kind of had ethan just choose where we went because if i had to decide i would probably break down with like the overwhelming amount of options in this home to go see so we started in the kitchen so this kitchen is actually probably the newest thing in this home i think it was redone in the 80s 80s at this point is still pretty retro so i was just as stoked to see this room but don't worry it's gonna get you more retro this is the coolest kitchen i think i've ever seen i think i know what that is because i saw a video about one of these it's it's the base of a blender right it is yes built into the countertop so you put your like blender on that make a smoothie yeah the ceiling is meant to match the shape of the counter and the light and the light matches and the stove top is like in here too right how is that even operated then i thought that'd be like a fake drawer so that there would be parts under there it's a shine on these cabinets everything is thought through and like built in everything and like this is what i aspire to do one day is like have a house this thought out but i also don't know like how you actually think about everything ahead of time one of my biggest takeaways from all the homes we're going to see today is built-ins everything was built into the walls as part of the home to function with the home kind of forever and it's so different than what we're seeing today where it's you have four blank walls and you just fill it with whatever furniture you want which lends itself to a temporary mindset and we can switch it up every few months which i know i'm guilty of but it's not something i want to aspire to be i want to have a home that's well thought out and designed once and it stays that way and i think built-ins kind of force you to do that because you can't really move them when it's part of the wall also i want this video to be like a conversational dialogue with you guys so like any thoughts on any of the stuff we're seeing today and talking about let me know in the comments below i would love to just chat about this more with you also by the way we have started a the sorry girls discord so if you'd like to continue this conversation on there more where i'm even more active and we can get even more nerdier about these things check it out link is in the description okay i just found something no it can't be this easy that is just wild that's incredible what kind of blended cocktails did they have back in the 50s this feels like like a margarita house yeah you got a pool right there the huge party space out there so cool so cool i am having one of these in my house one day i've said it here that was all are you seeing this behind you michelle oh my gosh this room was added in 1975 so the house was here before it ended right here yeah and then they decided that's just not enough space this room that we are heading into is the literal fiesta resistance of this entire home it is a great room in like the most simplest of terms this room is just everything and i i would have i would die to see this in its prime unfortunately it had to come to a little bit of vandalism which breaks my heart like you have no idea but we'll just try and look around that as we appreciate the room is this these are speakers yes those are built-in speakers on each side i believe they open up like wait what this is like probably speaker mesh so that your speaker was there and it would come through and it would sound good out here right right built-ins i'm telling you built-ins and this is like two windows meeting on a corner like i don't even know how you would do that these days so then what's back what do you think this was bar it looks like yeah you got the sink and look at this glass smoked glass smoked copper glass now do you know we were wondering this house when it was first built do you know like what it'd be worth then about 40 000 bucks it sold recently in october for ugly 4.25 million just for land just for the like the property just to tear this down 4.2 is nuts but also when you know what like the toronto housing market's like exactly it's actually not that nuts like when you think of this like we were saying how you can't even get like a tear down nothing like a million dollars anymore so like only four times more than for that yeah all of this right and then yeah so this is what they're gonna be building here i believe yeah oh i hate it there you go it's the house across the street and this is just so special right this is an absolute tragedy just seeing the proposed plans for what this house is going to be when they tear down the original one now i can't comment on how they're going to style it on the inside because i don't know that yet but just based off what the outside looks it is like fully devoid of all the character that this one currently has i really think that this home should be registered as like a heritage home and not allowed to be torn down and should be restored to what it originally was because i just the fact that we can never get these homes back again like the 60s is not happening again we have these homes once and then never again i just cannot comprehend that it will be demolished i don't know i don't know what we can do about it i don't have four million dollars holy from what i understand and i've researched this is a very expensive coach just saying i'm surprised this is still here of course it's probably a thousand pounds but still if you are the owner of this house please please get in touch before you demolish this because i would love if it's not me that these things go to that they go to somebody because taking all of the character and putting it in the landfill i cannot my contact info is in the description oh my god oh it does what why are they still paying the power bill for this house are you seeing this glass this is like smoked mar i don't even know what what this is it's like smoked marble mirror with oh and the fan is coming now lights in the wall this like silver sink and like wallpaper that matches the texture of the mirror because of course all of a sudden our office bathroom is like underwhelming that's how we get the most there but not taking her haircut i just can't i can't get over this watch yourself and somehow the wallpaper choices work like every room is different but it doesn't clash i'm gonna not look so that we can experience each room at a time yeah we broke rochelle like this almost feels like a set like i can't believe this was really stuck someone really made these choices and all seriousness and was like yes yeah this is what i want i would say choices if i didn't love these choices so much would the thought to wallpaper the floor and the ceiling and also shag the carpet ever occur to me no but i'm so glad it occurred to the original designer here as someone who's installed wallpaper before i have mad respect for this because to do it on the ceiling is probably that's so not easy and it's lasted too right 55 years speechless hopefully i don't even know what to say i'm just taking it all in like i just it's kind of everything yeah wow i love the built-ins yeah and the couch almost matches the curtains right just blue yellow carpet you really have to be confident in your choices here because this is not something you're not ripping up this carpet every year when you decide you don't like it like this is pretty permanent yeah oh my god for this one they said okay we're gonna keep it safe we're gonna keep the pattern off the wall and put it on the floor wow this is like someone's built-in closet but it looks like french doors everything i thought i knew about built-in closets is it's wrong what do you mean you don't have curtains in your building yeah what does it mean you don't have like actual like window pane coverings in your closets all right down here we go so the main room might have been the grandest room in this house but i think this room in the basement is gonna take the cake on the most retro 70s choices in a room wow what right that's just so much more work for you and like for what like it looks sick but like it looks like it almost moves like a sliding door or something but yeah there's like six of me right now and this oh i love it i mean this is like a showstopper do you think there was more of it at one point like it almost feels like it could go and i think well because over on the carpet here there's marks where they're looks like there's yeah if you have the second half of this couch hit me up i want it i want to wonder what this room has seen so cool and like that carpet is the exact red and blue of the couch wow the wallpaper which matches the tile scratches the little shower in there it's a bit creepy rolls of wallpaper really like all the extra wallpapers in there yeah i want to find the kids bedroom one yeah like i hate to say it but i'm surprised it's still here like that's just so cool so have you ever been in one of these houses and someone showed up many times unfortunately yeah it's not a good time so like who would it be was it like sometimes the owners sometimes like the people who watch over like the maintenance people sometimes even a neighbor like what are you doing in here and what happens they just tell you to leave usually yeah there's been times unfortunately where police have got involved it ended well i mean after we explain what we're doing and stuff and they see we have cameras and you know even let us go but i can only imagine worth it so we've seen this first house it's obviously incredible and there are still more homes that we're going to see today but i want to learn a little bit more about ethan personally and like how he's able to show me all of these homes so let's head outside and get some answers to those questions okay i want to know how did you get into this abandoned house exploration so hold on hold on before he answers that question because it's a good one let me give a quick shout out to wayfair i'm sure you all know wayfair as the site where you can get great home products to fit your personal style but i bet you didn't know that they actually have some really great shows over on their youtube channel in specific one show i want to recommend to you guys is a style is born if you are enjoying this video specifically please consider giving us a subscribe but also that means i think you will really like this show this show is hosted by arrow bessette who i personally just love in the diy at home decor space she breaks down common design styles that you probably are aware of but you might not know much about the history of in the mid-century modern episode she breaks down where the style came from and explains who some of the design pioneers were in the space do you know how the war and the race to space were both major influences on the plastic eames chair sold in every design store to this day well if not you can find out by watching this episode go check out the full episode of a style isborn and subscribe to the wayfarer channel so you can stay up to date on all of their great content i've included a link to it in the description okay let's get back to that answer one day on the way home from school me and my friends decided to go check it out and ever since then i've just been so into it i just i love the architecture just the thrill of i guess being somewhere you're not supposed to be and how many homes you think you've been in since hundreds if not a thousand what yeah i well first of all i just can't believe that there's that many empty houses when we're kind of in a housing shortage right i get that a lot yeah do you have a favorite home out of all the homes you've seen i do actually that one we passed the white one very very 1980s kind of reminds me of like miami vice type vibe oh yeah the glass block windows i love that 80s vibe i mean i got the 80s jacket you know so that's right and you said something about drake used to live in a really retro home and greeted it all or something it was a mid-century modern late 50s like the flat roof with the floor-to-ceiling windows the the sunken like living room like the conversation pit oh my god you're speaking my language right it was amazing they completely bulldozed it in 2016 and rebuilt what's there now i'm now boycotting all of drake's music did you get a chance to see that house before i did wow okay so there's another one we can go check out is it close should we go it is yep take a look let's go so now we're moving on to the second house that we're gonna see today and this is the oldest by far of the three that we are seeing it was built in 1957 and was lived in up until about 2016 when the owner unfortunately passed away so is it up for sale do you know where it is no it's just sitting just sitting yeah okay we started in the basement is that where we are we are in the basement yeah okay yellow sink yellow toilet oh my god that shower is the most claustrophobic thing i've ever seen yeah that's cool and the fluted glass so nice this is like a lot though okay you stay here rochelle so you have to go all the way around to get to the flat i've got the cool pattern on the uh oh oh my god yes it's like something you'd see it like a diner yeah like this is what they do when you're trying to buy like oh retro wallpaper now wayfair it's this pattern but this is like the real deal original yeah like just like like the font of these old things like the way that it's designed it's crazy that this is like the original you know like that's so retro but at the time that was like you know the most modern thing you could get probably right whoa yeah what is going on here is this like this like carpeting yeah i know is it even or is it just a packed work of like bath mats but the fact that like each piece has a trim makes it seem like oh yeah they were individually bought oh lots of mail what lots of junk mail doesn't matter how old your house is you can always count on mcdonald's to send you coupons oh yeah this is awesome yeah i love the wood walls so much right it's just something you can't quite get with paint yeah this fireplace is great it's wild that they have fireplaces like without even a real door on it and then carpet like with this past safety standards these days no i don't think so oh and there's lights under there too that would be cool to see at night like we can see it in the daytime i bet the first person to invent the pocket door thought they were really onto something i'll put the door in the wall so this is definitely older than the first kitchen we saw is this a sideways oven door have you ever seen this book i have not it's like a giant microwave what do you call this kind of countertop it's uh um formica the word is formica and it is the earliest version of what we now know as like a laminate countertop super popular in the 70s super cool to see it irl what what is this they look like the buttons on like an old what's the thing when you you picked the song off with jukebox yeah clearly my brain was just overwhelmed by the amount of coolness i was taking in because of course i know what a jukebox is but you have to forgive me if you can't tell i was so excited i think it's obvious i'm surprised to see a dishwasher actually that must have been like height of luxury at this time like you do not have to hand wash your dishes absolutely oh and it goes into another bathroom so this is like your little vanity before you're really in the bathroom yeah the wallpaper in the shower is a full choice seeing why it's peeling oh no way there's a hole in the floor which what likely goes to the laundry room yeah i was actually trying to figure out a way to like do that in my own house because our bedroom is like two floors up from the laundry room and it's such a trek to hike it down and i was like is there a way i can connect with the floor somehow to like make a little pipe because it would make my life so much easier why the laundry chute is now not standard in every home i don't understand maybe it's impractical to install but like that's the most genius thing that someone came up with and the fact that we're not using this invention which is just so smart i don't know i don't know i'm installing one in my next home oh my god no way this is like ventilation i guess yeah you've never seen that before have you seen that i guess it's because these don't open exactly right i can't imagine that's good in the winter at all now we're on to the third and last house we are seeing today this one was built in 1971 and was lived in up until 2019 which is fairly recent but unfortunately it is set to be demolished and likely replaced with something much bigger wow wow these beams are just like the pinnacle of mid-century so do you think this was ever outside the house just the brick makes me feel like right but i don't know it could have been like a sun room maybe the tall ceilings are just oh wow so what even would this be then it's like a little butler's kitchen yeah sometimes yeah i guess so the window is so high up are so nice in here like so light that comes in these are called claire story windows they're small windows placed at the top of rooms designed to just bring in light without affecting privacy or taking up wall space again another design element seen in old homes that i just don't know why we're not using more of to this day because it's so the genius trash compactor what is that trash masher so i looked into this more because i was just so curious about the function of the trash masher in the 1970s home so to buy one back in that day would have cost you about 200 and 200 in today's prices is about 1500 so this is definitely or was definitely a luxury item back then we don't really see them anymore and i think the reason it's actually a good reason is they have phased out because people are just producing less trash and more is going into recycling and composting whereas back in the day trash was your only option so you wanted to mash your trash very cool to see it in the wild though i like that like in the last place there's general electric here there's whirlpools brands have been around wow are you kidding imagine just like being here in the winter like how cozy have a nice big fire this is like the lighting these are clicks yeah like it looks like a giant flush mount yeah i take back everything i said oh look at this doorway this is the original arch people are doing arches now this is they did it first typical circle on the ceiling this is like something else do you think there's lighting all in there probably yeah there's an artist that does stuff like this he's the guy that made that big pink light in kendall jenner's house i hope you've seen it his name is james tyrell and his art was really popularized in the 1960s so i wouldn't be surprised if this feature was heavily inspired by him since his art was all about taking light and making light the art itself and definitely heavily featured the circle motif oh my god this room is beautiful it's like the curved fireplace and the little like built-in arch doorway that's neat i just love these beams so much they're so nice and these panels are really cool too oh wow i'm talking about a skylight we found the skylight of all skylights so you seem to know like a lot about real estate like is that just like a passion of yours or kind of an interest i guess yeah and then when people ask you like what do you do or like tell me about this how do you describe this it's usually a you know a weird conversation and people ask you know about it but i just tour houses that basically aren't going to exist soon and know just document it before it's gone it makes people like me and you know like us that just want to respect it and document it a bad name you know less and less of them every year exists as they be demolished and replaced and then like i can't imagine what was there like the year before or the year before that exactly right yeah i know i was saying this to you earlier in the car that like i feel like every year that goes past is like we're just lucky that these houses still exist because we're getting farther from like the 50s and the six exactly right some people understand it some people think it's weird but what's kind of the response been like when you've been posting these online do you ever get any people saying like how are you in these houses people ask well a lot of people think i have connections to like real estate agents and stuff they can give me them or to be honest i thought that at first yeah i was like how are you just finding so many cool places and like able to get in them oh wow i can't wait to watch where you go okay i think that was this is the last of the homes today yes cool well thank you again so much this has just been you made my my day my year maybe okay rochelle thoughts and feelings on how today went oh my god that was so much cooler than i could have even expected the things we saw some of the like the architectural features the appliances oh my god and that first house was something else that first house really set a standard that like i don't think any house could could be with to be honest that was just like everything that i needed to see it's so much cooler even than i was thinking too and i knew that it would be cool thank you for bringing me along thanks you're welcome i'm glad i got to share this experience with someone we talked about it at the end with ethan but i just want to reiterate again my thoughts on this is just that i am so grateful to have been able to see these homes before they are gone forever i anticipate there will be some people who disagree with the concept of going into homes that you don't own the access to and i understand that but i also think it's just so important to see the history and appreciate things before we don't have the opportunity to see them anymore i was so disheartened to see some of the damage that had been done to these homes because that would in no way be my intention when going into these and it doesn't seem like that was ethan's kind of mentality either it's sad that that's happened by people that have broken in and it's sad that it's happening by professionals who are gonna demolish all of these and they'll be gone um i wish there was something we could do about it but unfortunately i just don't have the budget to save all of these homes i wish there was kind of like like a pet rescue but for cool homes a cool home rescue i want to adopt them all i don't know it's a weird take that's how i feel but anyways uh massive thank you to ethan for taking me and rochelle out on this day honestly this is like a memory i will have forever we had the most fun seeing this and while we did tour all of these homes today what you saw today was not the full expansive tour of every room all these homes they were huge if you want to see the full house tours and see even more house tours of cool homes go check out ethan on tiktok and youtube i will leave links to all of that in the description below so you can go check him out give him a subscribe it would be it would be the only way i could give a thank you back to him for taking us on such an amazing trip i think that's all i had for you today make sure you go in the comments and tell me what your favorite thing that you saw today there was so much and i i'm curious to know what parts were your favorite and a reminder to go check out our discord where we can continue the conversation about this over there thanks so much for watching guys see you in the next one bye
2022-08-18 00:59
