The impressively-Victorian dining room at Chateau-sur-Mer. Yes, that thing in the center is all silver! All photos in this post are by A Scholarly Skater.
Chateau-sur-Mer is probably the most Victorian of all houses in Newport. It was owned by William Shepard Wetmore, who made his fortune trading with then-exotic China. When it was built in 1852 – long before the big four – it was one of the most famous houses in Newport. William’s son, George Peabody Wetmore, inherited it in 1862, and he had a massive addition designed by Richard Morris Hunt beginning in 1871. The house’s last owners were George’s two unmarried daughters, Maude and Edith, who lived in it together all their lives. They continued to host traditional Victorian teas in the mid-20th century, and they had the honor of hosting the Preservation Society’s first ever meeting. (I bet they served a lot of tea while discussing how to save Newport history.)
Chateau-sur-Mer’s lovely ballroom was the site of the Preservation Society’s first meeting.
Chateau-sur-Mer’s lovely ballroom was the site of the Preservation Society’s first meeting.
The house is Italian Renaissance-influenced. It is dark and dramatic, a bit like a haunted mansion. On the inside, it is highly ornate, as was popular in the Victorian era. The dining room is particularly imposing, but some of the other rooms are designed in the slightly lighter Eastlake style.
The great hall at Chateau-sur-Mer is three stories tall, with painted ceilings and beautiful stained glass. Unfortunately, it was hard to get all of that in a photograph.
More beautiful stained glass, this time beside Chateau-sur-Mer’s staircase.
The great hall is three-stories high, with painted ceilings on the balconies and a lovely stained glass window at the very top. According to our guide, the hall is made to look taller than it really is by reducing the size of the openings on each floor and the skylight. As is the case with so many Newport mansions, most of the contents aren’t original to the Wetmore family because everything was sold at auction after the last sister’s death.
Those Victorians sure did like to be dramatic!
And also romantic.
The objects behind the glass are hand-painted leaves, decorated and given as cards in China. You can’t see it in the photo, but the sparkled a little bit. They were so beautiful!
Arts and Crafts decoration at Chateau-sur-Mer
A Morris chair upstairs at Chateau-sur-Mer. The second floor had a lot of Arts and Crafts pieces.
The so-called “Moon Gate” used to look out to an ocean view. Oh, how times have changed!
Chateau-sur-Mer would be the perfect setting for a haunted mansion-type movie, wouldn’t it?
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Alexandra Kiely, aka A Scholarly Skater, is an art historian based in the northeastern United States. She loves wandering down the dark and dusty corners of art history and wholeheartedly believes in visual art's ability to enrich every person's life.
Her favorite periods of art history are 19th-century American painting and medieval European art and architecture. When she not looking at, reading about, writing about, or teaching art, she's probably ice dancing or reading.
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