Tour the Dick Van Dyke Show Home here:
This is also the set recently referenced in the first episode of WandaVision.
A funny thing about TV homes, they are made to look great on tv, but seldom resemble a real home. Case in point - most tv homes have walls at odd angles, rather than the 90 degree angles that we're used to. If you look at Rob and Laura's house for instance, you'll notice in the kitchen that the wall with the refrigerator, as well as the one across from it, are at an angle, rather than perpendicular to the walls that they connect to.
Another interesting thing in the Petrie floor plan is the fact that the bay window in the living room, would actually smash into one of the walls in the master bedroom. For ease in reading the floor plan, I pulled the bedroom wall away enough so that they wouldn't collide. But, in reality, if a home was actually built that mirrored the two stage sets - the living room and the master bedroom, the bay window would protrude into the next room.
In two episodes of the series, a basement was shown in the Petrie home. So, I allowed some space for this in the hallway behind the fireplace, since that is the direction they headed when they went to the basement. But, in reality, there would not actually be enough room for a staircase there.
As with all of the tv homes that I have re-created so far, I was amazed at how much larger the home is compared to how it appears on screen. Look at the vast space around the kitchen table in the floor plan above, for instance. It does not appear that spacious on screen. The same is true of the space between the patio door and the open shelving/buffet wall.
The above video is a little tour of Rob Petrie's office from the show.
And now, are you ready for some views of the home that you were never able to see on the show?
Here's the view Rob would have as he came home from work, parked his car in the garage and entered through the garage door into the kitchen. You get a straight shot of the front door from here.
This is the view a neighbor would see as they entered the front door. You can see the ottoman that Rob tripped over and the never seen fourth wall - creative license was taken on guessing what they might have had on that wall.
And what about Millie? She often came in through the sliding door in the kitchen. Let's see what her view would have been.
If you sat in the bay window, as some guests would do when Rob and Laura had a large party - this would have been your view.
The Petrie home, all dressed up at Christmas time.
Want to have some fun picturing remodeling this home yourself? I've included the living room stripped of all of its furnishings - the "bare bones," so to speak. Have a little fun imagining your own remodel of the incredible Petrie home.
For fun, I took the Petrie home one step further and did a re-envisioning of the home as a Mountain Vacation home. I lifted the ceilings to give the space a very open feel. And I added windows in the new ceiling height to bring in the mountain vistas. I also added a hallway between the master bedroom and the living room bay window and gave a designated space for a larger dining room. Wouldn't this make a dreamy lodge?
Just for fun, I decided to do a little video tour of the office where Rob, Buddy and Sally wrote the scripts for the Alan Brady Show. Check it out below.
Are you interested in finding similar furnishings for your home today? Then check out my "Where can I find something like that?" page.
* I have received no compensation for the call outs on these furnishings. I simply went online, on my own, and looked for items that were similar to those shown in the home.
Here are some similar furnishings for the kitchen and living room in the remodeled Petrie home:
A big shout out to the original Set Designer for the Dick Van Dyke home: Ken Swartz!
To visit other iconic TV homes, you can visit the home page at: https://www.mockingbirdlane.design/