Rhode Island

Crandall-Peirce House // 1890

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

Talk about a statement! This pink, Shingle style house is located at 140 Brown Street in the fashionable College Hill section of Providence, Rhode Island. Built in 1890 for William and Katherine Crandall, the Shingle style residence stands out for its cantilevered two-story tower and corner rounded porch at the corner, and of course the continuous shingled facades. William T. Crandall was the president of the Union for Christian Work, a religious charitable institution which provided aid to needy children in Providence. Augustus R. and Ida W. Peirce would board in the home for decades, and were likely family, inheriting the property upon Katherine’s death in 1932. The architect could not be located.

Cushing Apartments // 1902

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

Apartment buildings get a bad rap, largely because of the cheaply built monstrosities built after WWII through today; but apartment buildings can be dignified and fit within their surrounding context, it just takes good design. These are the Cushing Apartments at Thayer and Bowen streets in Providence’s College Hill neighborhood. The building was constructed in 1902 for owner, Stephen Cushing Harris, from plans by young architect Frederick Ellis Jackson (1879-1950), who would have been in his mid-20s when he designed it! While not an academic example of the Tudor or Colonial Revival styles, the building blends both in a unique U-shaped form. The building is supposedly wood-frame and was eventually purchased by Brown University in 1963. The college renovated the building in 2012 to serve as an upperclassman dormitory with LBB Architects and Gilbane Construction overseeing the project. The building adds a subtle density to the block without being overbearing with the courtyard design.

Francis and Sarah Cranston House // c.1895

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

The Francis and Sarah Cranston House is located on Bowen Street in the College Hill section of Providence, Rhode Island. Built circa 1895 for Francis Augusta Cranston (1837-1909) and his wife, Sarah (Hill) Cranston, the house is one of the best residential examples of Colonial Revival architecture in the city. Francis was the son of Barzillai Cranston, a descendant of Gov. Samuel Cranston, who held office from 1698 to 1727, being elected to office 30 times; serving as governor longer than any other individual in the history of Rhode Island. Francis worked as cashier of the Old National Bank of Providence for over fifty years and built this residence to settle into retirement. The residence is unique for its high-sloping hipped roof with two layers of dormers, corner quoins, Palladian window, and Ionic portico. I could not locate the architect, but if anyone knows, I’d love to give them their deserved credit!

Ellen and Ida Mason Villa // 1902

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

This large, low-slung and stuccoed Spanish Colonial Revival house in Newport Rhode Island, looks straight out of Southern California, thats because it is.. kind of. The Ellen Mason Villa was built in 1899-1902 from plans by Irving Gill, a southern California architect, for sisters Ellen and Ida Mason. The two unmarried sisters were daughters of Robert Means Mason a Boston millionaire, who had a summer cottage on the site that the family enjoyed for decades. The old Mason Villa was designed by H. H. Richardson, but burned to the ground in 1899, replaced by this structure. The sisters lived between Boston and here at this Newport estate until their deaths. In 1943, the property came into the ownership of the St. Michael’s Country Day School, who have both preserved the old estate house, but also added new structures to the campus. The house is unique as a rare Spanish Colonial Revival style property in New England, what a treat!

Original Means Villa

Sunnyside // 1886

Buildings of New England1 Comment
Photo from recent real estate listing

During the height of the Shingle and Queen Anne styles’ popularity, architect Stanford White of McKim, Mead & White completed plans for one of the earliest Colonial Revival style residences, “Sunnyside” in Newport, Rhode Island. The residence was built in 1886 for “Commodore” William Edgar (1810-1887) and his wife, Eliza Lucille Rhinelander (1832-1916). William was a co-founder of the New York Yacht Club in 1844 and heir to a New York fortune. Eliza was an aunt of Edith Wharton and a grand-daughter of William Rhinelander, co-founder of the Rhinelander Sugar Refinery. The property remained in the Edgar Family as Lucille Rhinelander Edgar (1858-1948), an unmarried daughter of the couple, would live here year-round with servants. The house is built of buff-Roman-brick with a large central block flanked by L-plan wings under a hipped roof punctuated by massive chimneys. Of special note on the facade are the rounded bays, entry portico with Palladian window above, and side porch.

Oakwood/ // 1902

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

Oakwood, another massive gambrel-roofed “cottage” in Newport, Rhode Island, is another of the McKim, Mead & White designed residences in the Old Beach Road vicinity of town for wealthy summer residents. Built in 1902 for George Gordon King (1859-1922), Oakwood is a large, elongated two-and-one-half-story structure with a gambrel roof with walls in pebbledash finish. Its off-center main entrance with double-height engaged Corinthian columns supporting a pedimented gable and a blind balustrade set on smaller Ionic capitals. The massive home was later converted to condominiums. It sometimes amazes me that families (but with many servants) would live in these houses just for a season…

Boxcroft // 1883

Buildings of New England4 Comments

“Boxcroft” (also known as “Whileaway”) is a historic Shingle style summer “cottage” on Red Cross Avenue in Newport, Rhode Island. While it is surrounded by vegetation and tucked away, not facing the road, the house is a landmark example of the architecture style and very significant. The house was completed in 1883 from plans by the architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White a white shoe firm who designed many summer cottages in Newport for social elite. The original owner was Samuel Colman (1832-1920), a well-known landscape artist, the first President of the American Water Color Society, a connoisseur of Oriental art and an interior designer in business with Louis Comfort Tiffany specializing in fabrics and wallpaper. Colman lived here with his first wife, Ann Lawrence Dunham until her death in 1902. The property was later owned by Mary Appleton, an unmarried daughter of publisher William Henry Appleton. She would sell Boxcroft to lawyer and socialite J. Coleman Drayton, years following his bitter (and very public) divorce from Charlotte Augusta Astor, a member of the prominent New York Astor family, following a cheating scandal by Charlotte. Mr. Drayton died in Newport in 1934. Boxcroft remains an architecturally and historically significant piece of Newport’s Gilded Age.

Mary Walcott Almon Cottage // 1883

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

Andrew Belcher Almon was born in Nova Scotia in 1824. He would enroll at Harvard College and graduate with a law degree before moving to Salem, Massachusetts, marrying Mary Walcott Baker, the daughter of Samuel Baker and Martha Pickman Wolcott. The couple first lived in Cambridge before relocating to Salem to live Mary’s widowed aunt, the late wife of Ezekiel Hersey Derby. After her aunt died, Mary and Andrew moved back to Cambridge until they built this fine Colonial Revival style mansion on Red Cross Avenue in Newport. No architect is attributed to the house, but due to it being an early Colonial Revival style house for the period, it can be inferred that it was a Boston/Salem-area architect. Does anyone know more?

LaFarge Cottage // c.1845

Buildings of New EnglandLeave a comment

Even the less ornate and grand summer cottages of Newport can have interesting histories! This c.1845 Greek Revival cottage sits on Sunnyside Place and is best-known as the summer home of nationally significant painter, muralist, and stained-glass master John LaFarge (1835-1910), active in the lively late 19th-early 20th-century Newport art scene. John LaFarge’s wife, Margaret Mason Perry LaFarge (1839-1925), was the granddaughter of Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, and was a native of Newport, seemingly providing the connection between her husband and lucrative stained glass commissions for many Newport and New York buildings. LaFarge is arguably best known for his innovative, opalescent stained glass windows, which was later stolen and adapted by Louis Comfort Tiffany. The LaFarge Cottage was possibly moved to this site and renovated, adding the glazed entry.

Maud Howe Elliott Bungalow // c.1912

Buildings of New England1 Comment

This shingled Craftsman bungalow on Rhode Island Avenue in Newport was built in the 1910s for Maud Howe Elliott (1854-1948), a Pulitzer prize winning author and active member in Newport’s art scene and her artist husband, John Elliott. Maud Howe was born at the Perkins School for the Blind in Boston, founded by her father, Samuel Gridley Howe. Her mother was the author and abolitionist Julia Ward Howe. In 1887, she married English artist John Elliott. John is known for his epic Symbolist murals including working alongside his friend and colleague John Singer Sargent to provide murals for the Boston Public library, and a mural at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. In Newport, Maud became a founding member of the Newport Art Association, and served as its secretary from 1912 to 1942. She also took part in the suffrage movement as she was greatly influenced by her mother’s ideas and convictions about women’s role in society and particularly so in terms of women’s suffrage. She fought passionately for women to be liberated from the societal expectations and roles determined to them by male dominated society. This was her home in Newport until her death in 1948.