art deco BATHS IN BLACK & WHITE

OWNERS OF A 1926 HOUSE DECIDE TO LOOK BACK TO THE ERA WHEN IT WAS BUILT, EMBRACING BOLD LUXURY.

- BY REGINA COLE | PHOTOS BY JOE McFETRIDGE

The traditional first-anniversary gift is paper, “so we gave each other the deed to our house,” say Michael Assetto and Joe McFetridge. The house is in Ardmore, a Main Line suburb of Philadelphia. “The ninth-anniversary gift is ceramics. We celebrated that one with redesigned bathrooms full of tile.”

Built in 1926, the house retains many original elements, including mouldings, window casings, and arched door openings. The old 1940s bathrooms, however, were tired; one had cracked tiles and the other a layout complicated by three doors.

“We wanted to create spaces that looked as though they might have been the original Twenties bathrooms,” says Assetto. “We did research into the décor of the Art Deco period when the house was built.”