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When designer Marissa Glantz found her Tower Grove South home in early spring 2023 she’d just about given up hope of setting down roots in a house. “I had been looking for over a year, and it was fun until it wasn’t,” Glantz says. “The housing market was rough, but I wanted to give my dog, Tommy, a backyard.

“I’m a younger single gal, early in my career, so this was a major step. Everyone kept telling me the perfect house will come along at the perfect time. I was tired of hearing that old cliché. Then, lo and behold, on my birthday last year this house hit the market. I called my Realtor first thing the following morning and she said, ‘How did you already see this? I just posted it in the middle of the night!’ I knew it was because this house was meant to be mine.”

The day also happened to be near the anniversary of her beloved grandpa’s passing. “He had been a World War II and a Vietnam vet. These homes were built just after World War II, so the perfect time idea fit. He was also an architect,” she says.

The following day Glantz toured the gray Lustron house that would soon become her home. “When I walked in I thought, ‘Wow! Grandpa would think this home is just the coolest thing,” she says.

Only about 1,400 of the 2,500-plus homes manufactured by the Lustron Corporation remain. They were built as a solution to the post-war housing shortage from 1948 to 1950. The all-steel homes clad in porcelain-enameled steel panels and topped with a steel roof were easy to maintain, resistant to fire and hazardous weather, as well as to gnawing insects and pests. The interior walls, ceilings, the sliding pocket doors and the all of the built shelving, display cases, dressers, vanity tables and more are metal.

She knew she would do whatever it took to get the house. Her dad, who is also an architect, obliged when she asked him to take a walk through with her. “Everyone who comes into these homes for the first time has something to say about it because they are not normal houses,” she says. Her dad was no exception. “He said, ‘Well, it’s funky and it’s really gray.” Glantz countered it wouldn’t be gray once she put her hand to the furnishings and art.

Luckily, the house had been well-maintained except for one big thing. “When I first moved in I could see a little bit of daylight through the attic, so I did research to understand what needed to be done. These steel roofs don’t exist aside from those that were originally made,” she says. She consulted the Lustron Facebook group and ended up hiring a painting company to patch any rust holes and reseal the roof with elastomeric paint. “None of the roof panels was damaged, thankfully,” she says.

Glantz thrives on the vibes from the 1960s and ’70s. She’s a pro secondhand shopper with a practiced eye for style and color. “I found a lot of my furniture and décor at different antique stores, thrift stores and on Facebook Marketplace. Everything inside the house too has a story, which I think is cool. It’s a ’60s colorful, funky vibe it’s definitely not gray when you walk in. My color palette is orange, yellow and green with pops of hot pink — very mod,” she says.

“I adore my dining room table. I got it from this like sweet couple on Facebook Marketplace. When I went to their house they were sitting at this table, which was in the garage. They wanted to sit and talk before they handed their table off to me. They told stories about their good friends who sat at this table, and it was so cool,” she says.

Glantz got into the ’60s diner vibe with this chrome and Formica table set. She admits she’s a little obsessed with the art and knickknacks around it, too. She uses the built-in hutch to showcase Pyrex dishes and a 1950s canister set. She juxtaposed a needlepoint stitchery piece in a round wooden frame made by a friend with a yellow and orange chair print by Toronto-based graphic artist Jazzberry Blue.

“I also found this really cute yellow and chrome bar cart at an antique mall. It’s perfect and everything on it is equally perfect. I have a ton of original ads and articles and manuals about Lustron homes that I had printed into big posters and I have these hung in bright orange frames in my dining area,” she says.

She chooses original art for her space, but her budget doesn’t allow for one artist she’d like to see brightening up the gray walls. “I’m a big Keith Haring fan. I don’t have any of his art because I‘m weird; I like original artworks, but his are too expensive. Still, I’m inspired by him, his art style, and his colors,” she says.

Glantz doesn’t stop with vintage furniture and cool art, though. She carries through with vintage sounds. “My vibe includes the music of the ’60s. The Grateful Dead, Dylan, the Rolling Stones. I’m mostly digital, but I have vinyls and a record player. I was into vinyl in college, and I haven’t yet circled back to that hobby. I have a bunch of that music from my grandfather from back in the day that’s super cool,” she says.

Although Glantz is tuned into the 1970s plant vibe inside her home, she’s just starting on the outdoor gardens and landscape. Lime green ferns and blue-green hostas may pop up with accents of vivid orange day lilies, bright yellow Asiatic lilies and deep purple salvia when Glantz’s flower power comes to Tower Grove South.