PORTFOLIO: Chambers Ranges and Cooktops
Seeing the beautiful kitchen settings that many of my clients build around their Chambers is one thing I love about my job. Often I will yank a stove in the middle of demolition, with dust and mayhem swirling around my lungs and mind as I'm driving away with the stove on the way to the shop. Man I wish that I'd been photographing those demos… They can be so gawd-awful, and so entirely different to the scene I return to with the repaired or restored stove.
Here are photos of a few of those stoves and owners in some of the more beautiful settings, some redone, others original:
Most of the settings I install Chambers in are vintage, and most of them are visually busy. That's why I like the stark contrast here, in my client's small cottage in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Compare this with her brother's place below.
A modest and elegant setting, brilliantly remodeled with vintage steel Geneva cabinets in a Chicago two-flat.
Tom and Nancy are both fantastic artists. They own a nice Model C low back in their funky Chicago bungalow. The stove shot is nice but heck with it, I love this shot so much better.
Joe with his pride and joy Model C, in a great original vintage "sunrise" kitchen in Elmhurst, Illinois.
This gorgeous space - in a similarly gorgeous Arts and Crafts home in Glen Ellyn, Illinois - was created by my friends Jim and Deb. Does it surprise you that they are designers?
The place that inspired this post: I was working on Mark and Michelle's Chambers in Lombard, Illinois while big guys were ripping out the floor and wall around their wonderful farm sink. On returning, I found the sink surrounded by clean symmetry, facing their model B blacktop shown below.
The presence of the yellow drapes, bowls, plates and tea kettle is so slight, yet so awesome, it totally knocks me dead. Mommy, I WANT THIS KITCHEN!!!
To the right is another Model B with black porcelain top and handles. Ironically, this was the cheapest version of the model, yet the black top and handles create such great accents in white kitchens, this one so very nicely done in Mequon, Wisconsin.
On a slim budget? Here's an instance of how a Chambers can BE the rehab in an existing, non-vintage kitchen. My friends Eric and Emma simply dropped in Baby Blue (which Eric helped me restore), then cleaned the cabinets, painted the walls, and added furniture and dishes that riff off of the stove. In my humble opinion, they got themselves the best dang kitchen in upstate New York, Millbrook, specifically.
I couldn't put two more starkly different photos together than the one above and the one below. My Munster, Indiana client loved her Chambers cooktop but needed to do a total rehab for her elderly mom's kitchen. Normally I prefer color but I gotta say that this contemporary monochrome treatment incorporating the vintage cooktop is quite attractive.
Finally, check out this gorgeous mint green Model BZ in a quaint cabin in Three Oaks, Michigan, near New Buffalo. First time I've ever seen a BZ in other than white or yellow plumage. Next to that brick chimney with that yellow faux lure… Mmmm mmm! That's a-nice!