Historic Places
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A Rainy Day at Monticello
Founding Father Thomas Jefferson designed his home, Monticello, in Charlottesville, VA. I visited on a very rainy September day as part of my vacation.
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Tour Great Architecture from Anywhere
While you can never truly experience a place from a screen, it’s nice to have the option to see great architecture in 360 degrees from your couch.
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Kykuit: Home of the Rockefellers
Kykuit is the Sleepy Hollow, NY estate of the Rockefeller family. It’s well-known for two things – its gardens and its modern art collection.
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The Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms
A short account of my Christmastime visit to the Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms. It was the home of American designer and entrepreneur Gustav Stickley.
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Newport Wrap-Up
If you’ve read all my posts in this series, you’ve officially been introduced to every Newport mansion I visited. (But not every Newport mansion, since unfortunately I didn’t get to visit two of them.) But my Newport adventure wasn’t entirely mansion tours. There’s lots else to see and do in town. The Redwood Library and Athenaeum is…
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The Green Animals Topiary Garden (My Newport Adventures)
Brayton Hall, the Brayton family’s former home, is located about 20 minutes outside Newport in the nearby town of Portsmouth. The primary attraction of this site isn’t the house, but the garden, popularly known as the Green Animals Topiary Garden. It has more than 80 topiaries shaped of like animals and objects alongside may other trees and flowers. My favorite topiaries were the owl,…
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The Isaac Bell House (My Newport Adventures)
The Isaac Bell House is very different from anything else I saw in Newport. While the Vanderbilts, Berwinds, and other prominent Newport families looked to the past to imitate Renaissance, Gothic, and Baroque architecture, Isaac Bell looked forward instead. Thanks to his architect Stanford White, his house (completed in 1883) began a new style that’s now called Shingle Style.…
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Kingscote (My Newport Adventures)
Kingscote was owned by George Nobel Jones, and then several generations of the King family (who obviously gave it the name). The home was built in 1841 but substantially enlarged in the 1880s for the Kings. The original house was designed by Richard Upjohn, and the addition was by McKim, Mead, and White. Kingscote is large and impressive,…
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The Breakers (My Newport Adventures)
The Breakers is the crown jewel of Newport, and it’s totally crazy to experience. Cornelius Vanderbilt II, who owned the house with his wife Alice, clearly saw himself as a grand Renaissance prince. The Breakers was designed to look like an Italian Renaissance palace by Richard Morris Hunt and completed in 1895.
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Chateau-sur-Mer (My Newport Adventures)
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…
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Rosecliff (My Newport Adventures)
Of all the mansions I saw in Newport, Rosecliff was my favorite. It was owned by Hermann and Tessie Oelrichs and designed by Stanford White, completed in 1902. Tessie Oelrichs liked to host parties, and Rosecliff was definitely designed to be her perfect venue. She hosted her first of many, highly-theatrical galas before Rosecliff had…
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Marble House (My Newport Adventures)
The Marble House (completed in 1892) was designed by Alva Vanderbilt, who was then the wife of William K. Vanderbilt. The house was designed by Richard Morris Hunt with decoration by Jules Allard and Sons. The Marble House is definitely over the top, yet it feels strangely accessible because none of the rooms are particularly…
