Summer's Over; "Fall" Into Our New News Page!
A new era has begun! For the past year, MidShipCentury has been in the process of a huge move involving ten forty foot trucks and the disassembling of our former residence as we have rebuilt our new home into a land-locked MidCentury ocean liner. During the process, the site has been dormant but our Facebook page has been very active with updates on key items from our collection as they have been repurposed for a new life in Oceanside, California. Some long-buried treasures have been uncovered in this process and will finally be added to the site, so please stay tuned and if you haven’t “liked” us on Facebook, please do so.
AUGUSTUS paneling! We’re especially excited about a selection of restored avodire/African satinwood paneling from the AUGUSTUS’ first class cabins and suites.
Covered up in cheap varnish during the ship’s final years at Manila, this remarkable, exotic woodwork (most of which has the cabin number and Cantieri Riuniti dell-Adriatico builder’s notations on the reverse side) now glows again and will soon be added to the site, piece by glorious piece!
National news! USA Today has just published a gallery of our images detailing the history of Carnival Cruises first three ships, the MARDI GRAS, CARNIVALE and FESTIVALE, all of which were scrapped at Alang. This trio of former British liners was fitted out with high quality woodwork, art and furnishings, some of which is still available on the site. Have a look at the gallery and see what cruising was like in the pre-mega ship era.
And then, be sure to come back and look some of the key items we have salvaged, including this stunning screen of etched glass and mahogany from the MARDI GRAS (ex EMPRESS OF CANADA). In the meantime, hope you like the new blog format for the News page, which will make it much easier for me to keep things fresh and current. Of course, there will be more to come on a regular basis, including images of some of the more recent beachings at Alang.
