Thanks to Craigslist and a really cool older guy in Niles, IL, we are now the proud owner of a set of four amazing Eames Herman Miller fiberglass arm shell chairs in seafoam green. (!!) (click the image above for more pictures)
They are from 1957, with metal glides on zinc H-bases. Two of them still have the foil label from that year. The maker’s mark looks to be the double triangles/mountains from Summit Plastics in Kalamazoo. I am in awe of these chairs, and our luck in finding them. We saw found them the day before we left for Florida and called the person selling them, who was awesome enough to hold them for us for a whole week until we could drive up there (it’s near Elgin, so we spent the night at my parents’ and hand an insane sushi orgy furnished by materials from Mitsuwa – more on that later).
Thank you, Craigslist. Oh man.

Dustin’s uncle bought this house recently; the interior needs significant renovation (the previous owners wanted a ‘Tuscan villa’ look and totally ruined all of the flooring, walls and woodwork), but it looks great from the outside at least. It’s huge, over 4000 sq. feet, with two stories and some great built-in features and brickwork. Also, the multi-level yard! Wow. It will take a long time to refurbish it, but I’m excited to eventually see it looking more like its original incarnation again.

A shot of our home office in the morning.

At “Carrie’s”, an odd little curio shop packed with random vintage stuff in downtown Champaign, we found a full 8-piece set of vintage Bodum glasses last Sunday. I am in love with their design and the clean happiness of the white handles. They even have the older Bodum creed stamped on the bottom. They look unused; I wonder what their history is, if any.

Friday’s sofa road trip wasn’t without its challenges, but we made it, and the sofa fit in the car, and we got a bonus Hang-It-All, so it all turned out alright in the end. The biggest surprise was that the sofa is blue; I had thought it was dark grey. Adding another color to our small and already somewhat colorful living space sounded risky to me but I think it worked out alright. The blue is starting to grow on me anyway.

See our new living room pictures here — the first sixteen are the new ones.

We’ve been looking for a new couch forever, and always had a secret wish for the right Eames sofa compact to happen along eBay or Craigslist. Today, it just might have. Pictured above is what we will hopefully spend a road-trippy Friday getting from Hudsonville, Michigan (right near Zeeland, home of Herman Miller!).
Updates to follow…

Before I left for my week in Elgin, we went to Seven Saints to try their famous sweet potato fries and variety of ’sliders.’ (Brandon should appreciate that.)
I must say they have perfected the art of sweet potato -> fry transformation. The sliders were un-amazing but maybe I just ordered the wrong ones. There was a salmon one I was curious about, so maybe for round 2.

I am in Elgin for the week house- and dog-sitting with my brother, combing the Chicago Craigslist for any cool mid century items that show up. I will do a post in the near future about our Craigslist finds, we have been really fortunate. One of my Craiglist idols is Jenn Ski, who scored a womb chair and an arc lamp for nearly nothing (the womb chair had been described as a “disco chair”… that’s the kind of creative search that scores you the awesome stuff).

Mizmo is developing great taste in furniture; lately his main hangout in the living room is underneath our LCM. Good kitty.

I’ve finally made the switch to the dark side/light side (depending on your views) and acquired myself a MacBook Pro (15″), on which I type this very entry. I had the opportunity to request one as my work computer, and I just got it today (a serious perk of working for a software company.) Here it is on my dining room table — more on this furniture later, but this picture includes an Eames table and four side shell chairs and a Nelson saucer bubble lamp, all of which is vintage. All that’s left is to replace the art on the wall there; nebulas are nice but I think we can do better.