You know, at Architectural Classics we all love old things – but we aren’t biased! There are plenty of new things we love too, and some of those are the advances in science and technology that mean we can do things faster and more efficiently. Efficiency is so important when it comes to your energy use – fossil fuels are limited, and we don’t feel very enthused about selling lumps of coal as antique oddities in years to come! The doors that you put all your gorgeous door knockers, door handles, locks and plates onto can make quite a difference to how energy efficient your home is. This...

It often seems that time and technology are moving faster than we can keep up with … and this phenomenon seems to accelerate more every year, to eventually be constantly bemoaned by our grandparents and other elderly people who stop to talk to you while you are waiting for a bus! But it seems that some architects were just a bit too keenly aware of this phenomenon, and planned quite a bit further ahead than they needed to. When London’s Barbican Arts Centre was built, the architects left out a front door. Why? Because they believed that in the not-too-distant future, nobody would be walking...

One of the stand out features of antique and reproduction pieces is the fact that they use materials that aren’t often seen any more – how often do you see objects made of pewter, copper brass, or even patinated brass in people’s homes? One of the others which has generally been lost to the passage of time is bronze – however at Dinsdale Petch (as well as at Architectural Classics!) the love affair continues. Like a golden or diamond marriage, it is an affair which is only made stronger by the passing of time! Dinsdale Petch make gorgeously detailed figurines, which can complement our...

Door handles are one of those things that have not changed very much in hundreds of years … our genuine antiques still look, and more importantly still function pretty much like door handles that are made today. This also makes it possible to easily and fairly economically create reproductions of antique door knobs also. They are not like the antique iron (which was, at a time, little more than a piece of shaped metal, heated, with a wooden handle so that you could hold it without burning yourself. They are also, at this stage (!) not like the antique clothes dryer – which had no electrical...

Thank you to BBC Homes and Antiques for featuring our Vintage Lantern and Real Homes for featuring our Crystal Door Knobs in their October issues.

A series of posts on doors in popular culture would be woefully inadequate without a post on the doors … yes, The Doors! The Doors were a rock/pop/pschychedelia supergroup in the 60s and 70s, headed by Jim Morrison of LSD fame, and also including John Densmore, Ray Manzarek, and Robby Krieger. Jim Morrison famously struggled with drug abuse, and died in 1971 of a heart failure … induced by what, it isn’t known. The remaining members continued playing without him, with Robby and Ray filling in on vocals for another couple of years, before drummer John Densmore left the band and obtained an...

Brass was once the predominant material for creating home hardware – it was cheap, readily available, and looked just a little bit like gold, for a touch of class. It has now mostly been replaced by steel or other alloys which technology has made more prevalent, but for those of us who love the mystery, lure and romance of anything old, brass is still a big part of our lives. From rings, to ornaments, to door hardware … if you want to look after your brass items, you will need to know specifically how to clean brass. That’s where the stark impersonality of modern technology actually comes...

A terrible tale of door knob abuse from the heart of Missisippi (when will they learn?!!), published here. Charlotte Wolff had a bit of a security habit – a near obsession with having locks and deadbolts on all of her doors, something that can be attributed to the horror movie industry! If they were smart, the security and horror movie industry would have all kinds of product placements and partnerships going :-). She locked herself in the laundry one night, and found that the only way she could think of to get out was to beat her poor door knob to death with a hammer … We nearly cried! Photo...

Since the internet doesn’t allow the luxury of conveying tone of voice (yet!), can I just warn everybody that this blog post has a sarcasm level of 4.5 stars! So it seems that one of our contemporaries (another door furniture expert – in this instance a specialist in knockers), has hit the jackpot! He has managed to get himself out of the door furniture business forever, as he had the good fortune (by dint of his ‘esteemed’ name), to be picked by a West African princess to be her legal guardian, and also the guardian of all of her money. It is a beautifully romantic story of hardship, betrayal,...