Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
World
Chloe Cawood & Ryan Fahey

Man lives like 1950s housewife and keeps home pristine with retro appliances

A man has revealed how he lives like a 1950s housewife by cooking and cleaning his home with retro appliances.

Travis Blades, 25 from Tucson, Arizona, has sworn off the bells and whistles of modern-day appliances opting instead for vintage devices - which he says work just as well.

The property investor's home is straight out of the 1950s with Travis himself feeling as though he was born in the wrong era.

Among his collection of original pieces are a pastel-pink washer dryer from 1953, an old-fashioned stove, and an electric fridge from 1954 which cost Travis £500 to get it back to its original condition.

He has also repaired a 70-year-old oven and a mixer from the 1930s.

Travis- who became obsessed with the post-war era as a child - now dedicates his days tracking down the retro goods from charity shops and online platforms like Facebook Marketplace, before revamping them for use. .

But Travis also follows a 1950s diet, using his old devices to cook the meals popular with American housewives "back in the day".

Travis said: "I own no modern appliances and I use everything as they would back in the day.

His kitchen is fitted in with what would have been mod-cons during the 1950s (Mercury Press & Media Ltd.)
He cooks every meal on his old-fashioned stove (Mercury Press & Media Ltd.)

"Although appliances look a lot different nowadays, the vintage ones work just as well because they were made to last.

"My fridge gets down to the same temperature as a new one would and the stove cooks as fast as one from the modern day."

Whilst the time-travelling 25-year-old is always on a hunt for the best deals, Travis admits to spending a large amount of money restoring the old appliances back to their original condition.

He said: "I am always looking out for a good deal and find vintage items in antique stores as well as searching Facebook Market Place and eBay.

Travis picks up his old-timey fittings from goodwill shops and by searching on platforms like Facebook Marketplace (Mercury Press & Media Ltd.)

"I can usually get the appliances fairly cheap however, I spend a lot more on the restoration process.

"I got the fridge for $75 (£57) but it cost around $700 (£530) to restore it back to it's original condition.

"The stove cost me $120 (£91) to begin with, and when I had finished doing it up, it cost me another $600 (£450).

"Because I collect vintage cars too - I have a 1956 Cadillac and a 1950 GMC truck, my vintage collection has cost me $35,000 (£26.6K) over the last 12 years.

"The fifties are such an intriguing frame of time - we just came out of World War II and there was a great burst of new technology.

"It was the time of the space race and there was a burst of new technology that was making it into the household.

Travis got the nostalgia bug due to his dad Rick, who used to take him to classic car shows (Mercury Press & Media Ltd.)

"It all started with cars. My dad, Rick Blades 56 started taking me to classic car shows when I was seven years old and we started our first restoration project on an old truck together when I was just 11."

As well as collecting retro devices, Travis is also is an avid collector of 1950's recipe books and loves to spend time in his kitchen whipping up vintage recipes.

He said: "I've got the old Betty Crocker cookbooks from which I like to cook from.

"Desserts back in those days are not as interesting as the ones we have now, but it's a fun way to make use of the books I collect."

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.