Older apartment buildings near downtown

[grumpyoldlady]

Just curious about this. Many years ago...around 1970, my [[now) husband I visited his dad in an apartment building near downtown. I don't remember the name or even where it is/was. Only thing I do remember is that it had a Murphy bed that folded down from the wall. Was this common in older apartments? Are they still used today in those buildings? Do the architectural salvage places have any that were removed before demolition of buildings? I think they are neat and great space savers, but the cost of a new setup is very high.

[softailrider]

I'd say they were very common. Most of the buildings that I've ben in have removed them, now there's just a closet where the pull down bed used to be

I think the Murphy Bed Company is still in business in some form, not sure if they have parts to repair the oldies though.

I have seen some new ones, they're different though. More of like a platform rather then a box spring that the mattress sits on.

[Lowell]

I had a studio apartment with a Murphy bed at 70 West Warren way back In the summer of 1967, while working a college-years summer job at the Rouge. [The WSU building that houses the Barnes & Noble sits on the site today.] It was convenient for creating space but there were issues.

My guess for their disappearance / discontinuance is that they could present a danger both in coming down and going up. They had some pretty strong springs. I think from the management side they had to be expensive to build and another item to maintain. For the tenant it didn't allow for configuration of another bed location. For instance removing the Murphy and using a single bed would free up the wall space for the bed and allow arrangement flexibility.

[EastsideQT]

My very first apartment in 1970 was a high rise on the corner of Van Dyke & Lafayette. It was a lovely studio apartment that had a bed that pulled out of a closet. I never used it because I had a sofabed.. Back in 1970 the rent was $75.00/month all utilities included free parking. I pass the building on my way to work everyday and it's just as lovely now as it was then [[well at least it's just as lovely on the outside.) I don't know what the inside looks like. I wonder how much the rent is now.

[cmubryan]

I managed an apt community that was built in the mid-80s in Ann Arbor. To this day, the community still has working murphy beds. We'd typically replace the mattress every time we'd turn turnover the apt from one resident to the next.

[preserve]

I think Murphy beds were very common - knew someone on Central near W. Vernor that had a Murphy bed, I believe all of the one room apts in that building did.

[cdavis9699]

I haven't heard of entire apartments having Murphy beds, but I was contacted by a college in Ohio about incorporate my murphy beds into their units. They had a great idea. By making the rooms slightly smaller, they could have a larger common area. To make it small they were going to use a murphy bed designs.

I build these. You can actually watch them being built on my live video feed at www.wwbeds.com

These are going to be a more modern design. When I get the design from the Interior designer, I'll post them on my Dorm page.

[ASR89]

Welcome to the forum, cdavis!

[Jimaz]

Yes, welcome to the forum!

I build [Murphy beds].

With all the concern about bed bugs I would think business is good. Is it?

[beanietek]

a friend in dearborn has a "ford" home - that has a bedroom in which the bed is actually lowered from the attic above using a crank - only about three or so of the ford homes had this feature. A murphy bed in the ceiling so to speak.

[masterblaster]

There is a 1920's era apartment building on Seward just east of the Lodge Freeway in the New Center Area that I looked into renting in 2003, and the apartments still had Murphy Beds.