The clean lines, the geometric decorative elements, the seamless blending of indoor and outdoor space… I sure do love mid-century modern architecture.
Do you know what I love more? My children. And that is why I will never live in my MCM dream home. Because mid-century modern architecture is designed to KILL YOUR CHILDREN. (Also, moderately clumsy or drunk adults).
We can be reasonably certain that none of these children reached adulthood.
As a public service, Projectophile is alerting its readers to the dangers posed by key elements of mid-century modern residential design.
1. OPEN LEDGES:
I love open, flowing space as much as the next modern girl. But I know it would only be a matter of minutes before my kid flings himself off one of these deadly ledges…
Red arrows show the direction of travel of children’s bodies
What four-year-old can resist that hidden nook?
That’s going to require at least ten stitches.
Where are all the children? Probably under that ledge, unconscious.
Someone needs to call protective services on this place, because this stylish modern mother is too absorbed in her reading to notice that all her children have fallen into the living room garden:
2. FIRE, WATER, AND OTHER DEATH TRAPS INSPIRED BY NATURE:
First of all, make sure your kid wears her helmet when she inevitably climbs up, and then falls of of, this rock formation in your dream living room.
Be sure to check those crevices for rabid bats.
As soon as you turn around to fetch the marshmallows, Junior is going to stumble right into that open fireplace (and stumble out with some third-degree burns). And watch out for that mysterious little nook on the right!
The use of indoor reflecting pools creates a calm and deadly space in your modern dream home:
Children in mid-century modern homes are advised to wear flotation devices at all times. This glamorous couple has no idea what danger lurks in that strangely-placed reflective pool.
“Darling, why is it suddenly so quiet in there?”
And for goodness sake, don’t send your kids trick-or-treating near this Mid-Century Modern fortress:
3. FLOATING STAIRS:
Nothing is more un-modern than an unsightly railing on your stairs. To add extra danger to your mid-century staircase, twist the stairs into a dramatic 180-degree turn, or simply make the angle of the stairs extra steep.
(Hey, aren’t these just a bunch of IKEA Lack shelves nailed to a wall?)
These extra-dangerous stairs lead right to the ceiling, guaranteeing a concussion for your curious child.
These soaring, multi-story bannisters add a touch of safety, but you know my kid would totally get her head stuck in between them. Keep a crowbar handy to pry her free…
The mid-century dream house below comes with its own on-site medical team, in the very likely event that your children will either drown, fall, slip on those mossy stairs, or impale themselves on a rock.
Or maybe that’s dried blood I see on those stairs?
If you care about your children’s safety, perhaps you’ll want to settle down in a late Georgian colonial revival.
projectophile 
Ugh. I just can’t help but feel bad for you. Not because you have kids but because you wrote this post. So depressing.
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Why comment like this? AKA: This is more sad. This article is funny.
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Apparently, you lack a sense of humor, Gordon. I, for one, found the post entertaining.
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Thank goodness most of my friends who love mid-century Modern do not share your lack of ironic sensibility, gordon. This post is hilarious.
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What utter stupidity. Here’s an idea for you people who subscribe to such idiotic thinking: seal yourself in a big protective bubble and float off into space.
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Sweet Sassafras, someone needs a nap STAT!
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Excellent idea!
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Seriously. I have to wonder whether a love for mid-century Modern requires one to have their funny bone removed. Or to be childless. Or both.
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My guess is that the author fell off the top bunk at some point, and has never since been quite right in the head.
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My guess is that you fell off the top bunk at some point and have never since had a sense of humor.
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Sarcasm might go a long way for those who don’t understand this…. or not.
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Haha! The ones who don’t get this should be the ones wearing the helmets and bubble wrap!
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Oh yeah, a sarcasm detector. That’d be ‘really’ useful.
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So funny! This is insightful and delightfully informative.
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WOW, thank goodness my kids have always been smart enough not to walk off a ledge, walk into the ceiling or crawl into a fire place. Perhaps just better breeding rather than remaking the world. After all, where are all the deaths from these features the first time around?
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I taste the lies in your statement. You doth protest too much!
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As a survivor of a mildly dangerous environment growing up – an environment where like today, the most dangerous activity is driving – all I can think is what a bunch of pansy wusses.
Yes, these spaces are not toddler friendly. Neither is a kitchen, bathroom, laundry, or garage.
Beyond that, these spaces are intellectually and physically challenging. Indeed, they’re intellectually and physically stimulating. Yes, they’re not handicapped friendly.
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So everything should be child safe? That will be a boring. No one will learn anything and we’ll all become obese and stupid.
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Please re-read the post with your tongue firmly planted in your cheek. Perhaps then you will get it.
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So you miss the sarcasm completely, follow that up with poor logic, and top it off with fat shaming? Let me make sure I’m following here. Children who grow up in safe environments become stupid and becoming fat? Hmmm.
Can you tell me what kind of house you grew up in? That way I’ll know which styles of house to avoid so my kids don’t grow up to be privileged bullies with no emotional intelligence who think it’s okay to mock people who aren’t smart or thin.
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Are you people serious? Are you so protective of your MCM that you can’t recognize sarcastic humor when it smacks you in the head.
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Best post yet! Kudos!
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Pingback: Mid-Century Modern housing designs vs children | Globe Law News
It’s a joke you morons.
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Obviously some of the commenters fell on their own heads in childhood, resulting in the tragic destruction of the area of the brain known as centrum sarcasm.
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I totally loved exploring the local ravines, with the cliffs to scale, and tree climbing. Once past babyhood, these places look like wonderful fun! a stimulating physical environment is a good thing for kids.
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Each one of these houses look like an old Bond villains homes. No danger of kids in these. Just ninjas and gangsters.
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Funny you say that. The last one, the Elrod Residence, designed by John Lautner, *is* the Willard Whyte house where Bond “meets” Bambi and Thumper in Diamonds Are Forever.
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Psst. Not everyone has kids. People without suicidal mini-me’s are probably the intended market for these houses. You may as well complain that pornigraphic films have content unsuitable for kids. No duh. It was never meant for kids. Not everyone wants to live in a round-corner, foam-padded, plastic playground of a house.
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This is a joke? Talk about Poe’s law. Sadly, plenty of people would make exactly these sort of complaints being totally serious.
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Awesome article!…As a designer and parent, you totally captured that constant conflicting inner struggle I experience whenever I see great MCM architecture. I love it, but almost immediately the reality of my 4 year old twins firmly plants me back on the couch of my safe Center Hall Colonial, confident that tomorrow probably won’t require a trip to the ER.
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LOL!
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Wonderful piece…the best out loud laugh I’ve had all day!!
I remember, as a young girl, looking through those beautiful hard-cover decorating books…fantasizing about one day owning one of those fabulous homes.
Luckily we’ve been safe in our cute little bungalows along the way. 🙂
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I for one would love love LOVE my kids to grow up in a house like one of these! There seems to be a lot of snark here in regards to people missing the point. I get that the tone is ostensibly humorous, but this focus on overprotective smother-love really rubs me the wrong way. Educate, don’t shelter. Teach your kids the skills to cope with danger, not flee from it. All this focus on hyper-safe environments is producing generations of coddled milktoast children who are rushed to the emergency room for a scraped knee. If your kid wont survive a fall from a three foot tall rock, will sustain grave injuries from a tumble in a garden, or will get their head stuck between any two things close enough together to get their head stuck between… well that says more about parenting skills than unsafe architecture. Its a wonder that there are more than 6 billion people in the world with all this “unsafe”ness everywhere.
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A lot of the MCM designs were specifically created to rid people of unwanted kids. It also worked for aged parents and stupids too. And once that unpleasantness was over people could get back to enjoying the hell out of those amazing houses !
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BTW our film http://www.coastmodernfilm.com covers some of the houses in this post.
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Pingback: 15 Mid-Century Modern Dream Homes That Will Kill Your Children - distrb.me
A few climbing ropes and these would be the best tree forts a child could have!
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Yes! Sound like fun for the whole family! 🙂
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The IKEA Lack shelves comment was spot on. Hilarious post!
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Reading comments and playing ‘spot the aspie’
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Jesus, those bendy stairs in section # 3 would probably kill me, and I’m 56. Forget kids, can you imagine someone with ambliopia or cataracts living in one of those houses with all those edges and ledges? They wouldn’t live there for long.
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A little survival of the fittest would be a great thing for the little brats.
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I say this with the deepest amount of compassion possible — for those of you making all these comments about “overbearing” and “smothering” parents — you build bad karma giving smug advice about things you haven’t experienced. If you do end up having your own kids, these smarmy lectures will come back to haunt you! (Speaking from experience!)
Chill. Learn to laugh a little. And understand that most people look at their homes differently when they have kids. Also, it’s perfectly legit to dig fab architecture or choose to not have children.
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Funniest thing I’ve read in days.
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The 4th one (ledge3.png) looks a lot like a house I saw when I was a kid around 25 years ago. I walked into a friend’s house for just a few minutes and was amazed by the layout. I’ve had this image imprinted in my mind which I haven’t thought of in a long time until seeing this. Where is that home?
p.s. Very funny article.
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The problem with this article is that there are people online who seriously act as if anything not wrapped in foam batting is an attempt to murder their “precious”. They are so over-the-top that this article really didn’t sound very sarcastic.
And anyone who’d ever worked in the children’s department of retail outlet would say to all of this
“and the problem here is what, exactly?”
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Thanks for a great laugh. If I had ever had a chance to live in one of these beautiful homes, I would simply have had little mechanical children instead of the live ones I raised.
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Ugly they may be- but as a handrail installer I assure you that almost none of these examples would pass the building code (at least in my neck of the woods)
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Note to self: Owning a MCM will keep annoying, hovercraft-parent friends and their bratty kids away. 😉
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Wow people. It’s a cute little blog post about how un-baby proofed MCM architecture is. STOP TAKING THINGS SO SERIOUSLY! Name calling, insults, panties in a twist… No sense of humor for MCM home owners I guess.
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Umm… as someone who has to design within the parameters of current safety codes and building regulations I love this blog, and MCM in general, but as quite a number of the more noteworthy of these buildings has a tendency to move from residential to more public uses I’m also rather depressed that the blog is entirely spot-on in terms of the potential for cotton-wooling in the most un-aesthetic manner possible.
Perhaps an idea for a post could be (with apologies to Prince Charles) the most humourous carbuncles added to ‘carbuncles’.
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Wow.
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Sorry, my “wow” was directed at a previous (and seemingly now deleted) comment, not the article (which I found hilarious)
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lesson learned: don’t leave a comment box open on a funny article. It’s a place for trolls to breed.
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Accurate and funny. Before you scream “UNSAFE!” remember everyone over 40 survived growing up without seat-belts, child safety seats and Airbags in newer cars, The Nanny State hadn’t arrived yet. (Took Mom 30 years of 3-point seat-belts to *finally* break her from throwing her right arm out whenever she braked hard. Usually nailed me right in the face.)
A lot of these MCM Homes can be Idiot-Proofed to current standards (if the City forces it) without wrecking them too badly – They do wonderful things in invisible glass ‘railings’ for that patio on the roof, and tensioned stainless wire rope or big nylon monofilament to block the gaps under a railing without visual distractions – back up 20 feet and they disappear.
The curved floating tread staircase would be a challenge – but an outside handrail can be curved to fit. They can match the curves in Safety Glass if you make templates, send them to the glass factory and wait a few weeks. And block the gaps in the risers with glass too.
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Loved the write up. I have a 4 yr old daughter and I can emphasize. 🙂
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*sigh* Beautiful houses, not gimp friendly. It’s not kids I’d worry about, but me being clumsy. The glass handrail/bannister concept is awesome – it looks great, and allows for a certain level of balance impaired habitation.
Interesting post.
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killjoy
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Pingback: Mid-Century Modern Home Designs That Seem Intended to Harm Kids | GeekDad
Very funny! And splendid houses, I have to say.
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World-proofing kids beats kid-proofing the world.
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Hilarious! Got a good laugh out of this!
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They have a solution now for the no railings. Very thin cables that are not visible from a distance are used as railings. I know of a house with a porch that looks scary until you’re close enough to see them.
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If you read the comments section, the only thing I assume is defenders of these spaces: 1. Actually do not have children themselves. 2. Have never had an accident themselves, so they assume accidents do not actually happen. 3. Are willing to take unnecessary risks of a stagnant pool of water in their living space or stairs going nowhere to look cool regardless of any common sense. 4. Think you can “parent” an infant not to roll and scooch or a toddler not to toddle… Good luck with that! The trouble with the “extreme” cult is the “Look, Mom, I’m not dead (yet)” mentality… I am duly unimpressed with your stupid death-defying antics.
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Reblogged this on Outspoken and Freckled.
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as a parent I certainly understand the potential danger, but at the same time all these red arrows point to is the lack of early child education and commitment on part of the parents in the first years…another sad sign of the times.
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