Homes and Hues

Old Police Station Converted into ApartmentsThe town of Dudley in central England has a new police station, so the old one has ceased normal use since 2017. The Daily Mail reports that now it’s a different kind of prison—a set of apartments. For £750 ($925 USD) that one of the studio apartments includes a functional cell inside. The bars are painted grey, which nicely accents the grey floor and feeling inside of you.

A Stately Home vs. a Manor HouseYou don't have to read gothic novels to come across the terms "stately home" and "manor house," but if you do read such novels, you see them all the time. If you peruse American real estate listings, you see that some realtors love those phrases but really have no set definitions of them. So what do they really mean? The terms come from Britain, where homes go back a long way, and the aristocracy once had the means to build their houses big, beautiful, and sturdy enough to outlive them all. Although the definitions can change over time with changing circumstances, the stately home is different from the manor house in era, architecture, and usage. Number One London gives us four criteria for each, but since they are qualified with "mostly" and "usually," you can assume that if your home fits most of the criteria, you have either a stately home or a manor house. Or probably neither, sadly. There are other terms such as "estate" and "castle" and "country home" and "hall" that the blog will try to define in the future. -via Strange Company(Image credit: Rodhullandemu)

A Big House With Some Really Interesting FeaturesThe internet has taken notice of a home listing that illustrates the difference in home prices by region. This house covers 2,900 square feet and has five bedrooms and five bathrooms on 3.6 acres. It also has a mother-in-law suite and an extra cabin on the grounds. The asking price? $349,000. Really. This home is in Florence, Alabama, where you can get such a house for under a million dollars.

Do You Really, Really Like Aqua? This beachfront house in Hopkins Landing, British Columbia, takes its inspiration from the sea in a big way. Anything that's not blue is green, or somewhere between the two. This is SeaGlass cottage, a 1,289 square foot house with three bedrooms and one bathroom on a little more than an acre.

Lively Front Yards Make Happier NeighborhoodsIt was once a given that your front yard should be small but welcoming, with chairs on the porch to make it easier to talk to people walking by, while the back yard is a private family spot for vegetable gardens, cookouts, and children's toys. Now science is looking into what a front yard has to do with the wellbeing of the people living inside. The hypothesis was that front yards that showed a sense of the resident's personality led to stronger ties among neighborhoods. This sense of personality could be anything from carefully planted flower beds to chairs to flags to holiday decorations to welcome signs. A group of researchers rated homes in Buffalo's Elmwood Village neighborhood by their openness and personality, while a different group contacted the homeowners and had them take a survey on their sense of place. The results show that front yards with personality and a sense of welcome correlated with the residents's contentment, attachment to the neighborhood, and stronger ties with their neighbors. Homes that had fences or hedges in front showed a negative correlation. It makes plenty of sense to me. I met most of the people in my neighborhood just by being outside near the street. Those who were home to see the eclipse ending up all observing it from the same yard. Read about this study and others that corroborate it, plus ways you can make your front yard appear more welcoming at The Conversation.(Image credit: Reading Tom) 

How to Make a Broken Lamp Work AgainI love antiques, and I'm always on the lookout for something vintage that will work in my home. But I have a problem with ancient electrical appliances, the kind with well-worn fabric-covered cords that whisper "fire hazard" in my ear. That's why I'm looking for a real pedal-powered sewing machine, but that's an entirely different story. Antique lamps are lovely, but useless if you are afraid to plug them in. It's the same for a great-looking lamp you find at a bargain because it doesn't work. But now you can make it work, and have a wireless vintage lamp!All you need are battery-operated light bulbs. No, not a flashlight, but real bulbs that screw into a socket, but don't need any electrical connection. There are many of them available. They have screw ends to fit into the lamp sockets, and come apart so that you can charge the LED light with a USB connection. Stick one of these into your vintage lamp and you don't even need a cord anymore, which is great if you have an old house with an insufficient number of electrical plugs. Plus, you'll have a brighter light than the original owner ever saw. Just be sure that the bulb you buy isn't too big for the lamp and shade you found at the thrift store. Read more about this wonderful workaround at Apartment Therapy. And now I can think of at least two lamps I regret getting rid of. (Image credit: Thomas Quine)