Princess Rio
I’ve been ogling what i believed to be an original marketing brochure for my neighborhood on Amazon for close to a year now. I held back because it was listed as “San Mateo, Florida” – unfortunately ambiguous. I sent numerous e-mails to the seller for clarification but I think they were blocked as spam. The brochure was a bit pricey so I didn’t want to just buy it then find out it was really for San Mateo, the Central Florida town instead of San Mateo, the North Florida neighborhood.
I finally got the courage and coin together and bought it anyway. It arrived today and I can estatically report that it is indeed for San Mateo, MY NEIGHBORHOOD. In fact, not more than two pages in I found MY DINING ROOM – well, a reasonable facsimile, anyway:
The screen block is different and less wide, but that’s EXACTLY how I’ve got my table and china cabinet arranged – they’re both the same size and shape, too. Incredible! And with all that whining I did over the dining room light, now I know exactly what should go there. Ha!
The rest of the brochure is filled with delightful photographs and drawings of the different styles of houses – you can see the entire set on my Flickr. Turns out that our home is a combination of the “Princesa” and “Rio” plans, and we have a “Florida Basement” which I’d never heard of before.
I also noticed that all of the exterior drawings were signed “Brewsaugh.” A quick google leads me to believe this is the work of Leland Brewsaugh. Sadly, Mr. Brewsaugh passed away in 2003 but his wife Elizabeth seems to still be in the area – and is still creating art. Awesome!
August 7th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
I cannot say it enough – the internet is amazing. YAY THE FUTURE
August 10th, 2009 at 10:39 am
That is really neat! Very fun find.
October 18th, 2009 at 9:17 am
The car entrance reminds me of a home on the TV show, “Highway Patrol” where the lady pulls through in her car, goes in the house and there sits her husband, fresh from prison. I rewound it several times just to see the car pull from the street into the carport. Love it.
And on this one, the Florida basement???
August 24th, 2010 at 1:39 pm
I live here! My parents moved into their home in 1962. I am also friends with Dot Mathias and yes she lives in the same home. I grew up in SanMateo and my father was the Boy Scout leader for years at San Mateo Elm. I now live on Avery, but my mother is still in her house right up the street.