Frederick Ayer Mansion
| Frederick Ayer Mansion | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| National Register of Historic Places | |||
| National Historic Landmark | |||
| Historic District Contributing Property | |||
 The building in 2008 |
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| location | Boston , Massachusetts , United States | ||
| Coordinates | 42 ° 20 '58 " N , 71 ° 5' 25.2" W | ||
| surface | 4,899.9 ft² (455.2 m² ) | ||
| Built | 1899-1901 | ||
| architect | Alfred J. Manning, Louis Comfort Tiffany | ||
| Architectural style | Neoclassicism | ||
| NRHP number | 05000459 | ||
| Data | |||
| The NRHP added | April 5, 2005 | ||
| Declared as an NHL | April 5, 2005 | ||
| Declared as CP | August 14, 1973 | ||
Today's Bayridge Residence and Cultural Center is listed under its original name, Frederick Ayer Mansion, as a National Historic Landmark on the National Register of Historic Places . The building, completed in 1901, is located at 395 Commonwealth Avenue in the Back Bay district of Boston in the state of Massachusetts in the United States . It served the eponymous entrepreneur Frederick Ayer as a residence during his lifetime and today it is of particular importance in terms of architecture and history.
architecture
Outdoor areas
The five-story house stands on a rectangular lot on the north side of Boston Commonwealth Avenue between Massachusetts Avenue and Charlesgate East. The front faces south and is set back approx. 3.6 m from the sidewalk. The property is demarcated from the sidewalk by an iron fence, which was added later. A paved footpath leads to the entrance. On the east side of the building, steep granite steps lead down to the basement. The area between the building and the footpath is sparsely overgrown with a few plants. On the north side there is a 7.5 m deep car park that extends to the adjacent Marlborough Street. In the early 1970s, the building was connected to the adjacent residential building.
The southern facade of the style of neoclassicism built building is large granite blocks , which in some places with rods made of limestone decorated. At the height of the first two floors, the building has an outward curve, the roof of which forms a balcony on the third floor, which is bordered by a parapet .
In many places on the outer wall - including the main entrance and the balcony - there are mosaics . They consist of glass and stone elements and were fixed with cement . These are the world's only mosaics by Louis Comfort Tiffany that are still in their original state ( in situ ) on an external building wall . However, four of the original seven mosaics on the balcony have been lost. The red, orange and gold-colored mosaic elements create a subtle contrast to the otherwise unadorned granite cladding of the building. In addition to unique elements, there are also repeating geometric patterns that were also used in the interior of the house. The address board attached to both sides of the entrance is also made of mosaic stones. The geometric design of the building's mosaics shows the influence of Byzantine templates on Tiffany Studios.
Seven broad granite steps lead to the entrance, the top landing being flanked by knee-high walls. The double door is flanked by modeled columns that are clad with opalescent glass mosaics. The frame of the mosaics is made of lead. The upper end of the columns is formed by capitals , which are also decorated with acanthus ornaments , also designed as glass mosaics .
The visible side walls and the facade on the back are made of red bricks and have no mosaic decorations. The arched windows at the rear have granite window sills and splayed arches made of bricks from the second to the fourth floor. The arches on the first floor are more detailed, while the windows on the fifth floor have simple granite lintels . On the top floor, a narrow opening was walled up with stones that clearly differ from the original structure.
Indoor areas
The rather inconspicuous exterior of the building gives no indication of the opulence existing inside. Tiffany's works focus - as was customary with his designs for wealthy customers - on the public entrance area on the ground floor. With the exception of a few windows and pieces of furniture, the private rooms contain almost no Tiffany elements. The Ayer family's rooms on the second and third floors were furnished in the style of the Classical Revival with typical Boston features, which contrasts with the public spaces designed by Tiffany.
entrance
The copper-clad doors of the main entrance, together with the glass mosaics of the flanking columns, form an imaginative transition from Commonwealth Avenue to the interior of the building and initially lead into an outer vestibule with a barrel vault . The floor is decorated with mosaics and has three steps of slate , the walls are covered with sand cast in resin . In 1971 a window for a reception desk was installed in the west wall as part of the connection with the neighboring building. A double door made of oak wood and glass elements leads from this outer entrance hall to a second vestibule, which has a cross vault , while the floor and walls are designed in the same way as the previous area. This inner entrance area is connected to the following marble hall via a wooden door.
Marble hall
The as Marble Hall ( English Marble Hall ) called, elongated space is about half as wide as the building itself. The eastern wall of a apsidal dominated bow and a marble staircase, is located on the west wall is a fireplace. In the north there are entrances to the former dining room, in the south they lead to the salon and again to the entrance hall. In 1999, color analyzes showed that the plaster was originally painted brown-yellow and covered with a layer of shellac .
A four-story staircase leads through an elliptical opening in the ceiling to a likewise elliptical window in the roof of the house. The lead glass window listed there in 1903 has meanwhile been replaced by a more modern clear glass. From a cross-bar under the window hangs over all floors chandeliers made of bronze down to a composite of glass mosaics ball is at the lower end.
The hall got its name from its brilliant white , around 1.8 m high marble paneling and the floor mosaics consisting of white marble pieces. The girders and arches of the hall are decorated with geometric patterns of Islamic art in blue, green and white colors. The mosaics in the floor contain randomly distributed mosaic pieces in a brownish yellow color, which corresponds to the original wall color. The floor is framed by a geometric mosaic of blue, green, white and gold pieces of glass.
The fireplace in the west is also made of white marble. The fireplace surround and the fireplace itself have mosaic medallions and a mosaic frame, the elements of which have an opalescent green, blue and white color and are glued on a gold foil. On the sides of the fireplace, bronze grilles are embedded in the floor. In 1971 a passage to the neighboring building was created north of the fireplace. In the east wall, next to the doors to the dining room, there is an indentation that was apparently used as a telephone box earlier. The furnishings of the former dining room were completely removed before 1964. Today there is a chapel there .
Left and right of the apse framed with mosaics in the east wall are two wooden doors, the northern one leading to the former flower room and the southern one to the elevator of the building. Inside the apse arch there are two more doors, hidden within the paneling, which lead to the flower room or to a former cloakroom . The blue, green and white mosaic stones are embedded in the plaster of the arch, behind which there is a hidden ring of sockets. They were presumably used to illuminate the proscenium during amateur theater performances .
The shaped upper end of the paneling widens on the back of the apse to form a plate from which a narrower round arch extends to a winged staircase that leads to the hall on the next floor above. The arch frames a spectacular trompe- l'oeil - peristyle mosaic on the back wall of the double staircase.
salon
The salon is located to the south of the marble hall and has a basically square floor plan, which is rounded off on its south side by the arched wall, in which there are three window openings. The room is furnished in a classicist style and has a plastered ceiling in the style of eclecticism , to which a suspended ceiling was initially attached, but which was removed in 2000 and the original ceiling design with floral patterns restored.
A 90 cm high wooden base paneling runs along the walls, above which the walls are also provided with paneling , the recesses of which are painted mustard. Between the panels of the paneling are narrow pilasters in a faded peach shade into which modern wall sconces have been integrated to replace the original Tiffany lamps. On the east side there is a fireplace with a fireplace.
The floor is made of oak parquet with a geometric pattern. The middle window was designed by Tiffany from stained glass and has a complex pattern that reveals clear Byzantine influences. The elements are in shades of orange, green, yellow, pink, carmine and the opalescent white typical of Tiffany, which means that the window design subtly picks up on the colors of the room.
Staircase
The apse of the marble hall opens to a double staircase made of white marble that receives natural light through a Tiffany-style skylight. The stairs are framed with marble from the floor to the level of the paneling in the hall. Above this demarcation, the walls are covered with brown-yellow plaster. The 1.2 m × 6.1 m roof window was restored in 2002 with the help of the original parts that were still in existence; missing parts have been replaced with rare original pieces from the New York Neustadt Collection of Tiffany Glass . The window is divided into eight rectangles and shows a wide range of different types of glass, which are connected to one another with lead . It takes up the color scheme of the mosaics in the marble hall and the chandelier.
In the course of the restoration work, lamps were also reinstalled above the roof window, which can create different lighting moods at night by illuminating the mosaic. On the east side of the stairs is an outstanding trompe l'œil glass mosaic, representing a masterpiece of Tiffany's mosaic technique. It creates the illusion of a peristyle extending behind the stairs . The mosaic cleverly uses the slightly protruding plinth paneling of the marble hall to create a perspective impression; the paneling that actually ends at the mosaic becomes the architrave of the peristyle. Opalescent glass elements applied to the plinth paneling reinforce the three-dimensional effect of the mosaic.
Hall on the first floor
The two-winged staircase leads to a hall designed as a picture gallery , from which the elliptical main staircase leads to the top floor. The gallery has centrally arranged seating and a filigree wooden balustrade . On the east side, two square wooden columns protrude from the floor to the ceiling of the floor above. The plastered walls are painted a matt orange tone, the floor is covered with PVC tiles . Originally, portraits of the Ayer family as well as landscapes and paintings with everyday scenes hung on the wall above the staircase.
Private rooms
In the north of the hall, a corridor leads to Mrs. Ayer's former private room in the northeast corner of the building, which, along with the breakfast room on the third floor, is one of the only two original private rooms that have survived. The floor plan is square with plastered walls and a modeled cornice on the ceiling. In the middle of the eastern wall there is a wooden fireplace surround with fluted pilasters and clad with glazed stones. A crystal chandelier hangs down from the center of the ceiling, which is most likely not part of the original equipment and therefore not from Tiffany. Two windows in the north wall look out onto Marlborough Street.
Library
In the southern section of the hall, a connecting door leads into a small, rectangular anteroom, while the passenger elevator was located in the eastern wall. The immediate area around the original wooden door to the library consists of carved columns that support an entablature . The east door of the anteroom leads to the library, the west contains a built-in wardrobe.
The library has a square floor plan, identical to the salon below, and a plastered ceiling. The original wall covering made of velor no longer exists, but the rods made of dark wood, arranged in ornaments, have been preserved. An elaborately carved, 28 cm deep wooden frieze extends over the entire wall . Each element of this work of art has a unique motif, each showing the bookplate of famous people. In the middle of the east wall there is a lavishly decorated fireplace surround with a supraport that extends deep into the room. It is supported by two fluted columns with cymatium - capitals framed, on high pedestals sit and have a architrave support, in turn, with a carved frieze with a repeating pattern of stylized Phialen decorated. In 1977, when the room was converted into a chapel, an altar was erected in front of the fireplace and the floor was carpeted. The former built-in wardrobe in the west of the room now serves as the sacristy . The oak door leading to the hall in the north wall is framed by pilasters in Tuscan order standing on high platforms , which support an entablature above the door.
Stairs to the fifth floor
The elliptical staircase extends from the hall on the first up to the fifth floor, where it ends at a likewise elliptical skylight. A chandelier extends over the entire height, at the lower end of which there is a glass ball designed by Tiffany. The staircase is bordered by a wooden balustrade, the balusters of which are fluted up to the third floor and smooth beyond that. At the height of each floor, a light element designed by Tiffany, which partly consists of several individual lights, protrudes from the main branch of the chandelier.
The levels on the second to fourth floors contained the private rooms of the Ayer family, while the fifth floor again belonged to the public areas. An elevator formerly also led there, allowing guests to drive past the private levels and get off on the top floor. The difference can be seen, among other things, in the fact that the private floors are much simpler than the richly decorated public areas.
breakfast room
The breakfast room on the third floor is one of the two original private rooms of the Ayer family. Like Mrs. Ayer's private room on the first floor, it too had no Tiffany elements and its floor plan is identical to that of the library below. Today the room is divided into two parts and therefore only has two of the three original windows. The former middle element extends from the floor to the ceiling and serves as access to the balcony.
Historical meaning
Completed in 1901, it is the only building still in existence in the world to have decorations designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany on the exterior. The Mark Twain House in Hartford, Connecticut and the Pierre P. Ferry House in Seattle also have Tiffany interiors. The Frederick Ayer Mansion has therefore been extensively studied by many historians. Tiffany expert Alice Frelinghuysen ranked the building as one of the most lavish of his works, and architectural historians Bainbridge Bunting and Douglass Shand-Tucci highlighted its importance in local architectural development. Via Frederick Ayer himself, the building is linked to regional economic history through his activities in various branches of industry.
The Frederick Ayer Mansion was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 5, 1973 as a Contributing Property of the Historic District Back Bay . On April 5, 2005, the building was granted National Historic Landmark status . On the same day, Frederick Ayer Mansion was listed as a separate architectural monument in the National Register of Historic Places.
Louis Comfort Tiffany
Louis Comfort Tiffany was one of the first interior designers and co-founded this profession. His work for the Associated Artists (1879–1883) contributed to the international establishment of the American ornamental arts and laid the foundation for his career, including during the Gilded Age . He renovated the White House for then US President Chester A. Arthur and designed apartments and houses for the most influential families in the United States. Its main target group were personalities who wanted to present their financial wealth and high social status after the Civil War .
Tiffany was also one of the first celebrity designers in the industrial age , cleverly taking advantage of the burgeoning mass media and new opportunities in photography to increase his profile. He worked with architects such as Stanford White , Bernard Maybeck , Peabody and Stearns , George B. Post , Edward Tuckerman Potter and William Appleton Potter and designed designs for with painters such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec , Edouard Vuillard , Pierre Bonnard and Paul Serusier Window. Through these connections, Tiffany extended its influence to all types of buildings and designed facilities for churches, theaters, universities, memorials and mausoleums, among other things .
His innovations in glass manufacturing and interior design quickly gained international recognition. Exhibits of his art objects regularly won awards in international exhibitions in the 1890s to 1910s. In Europe in 1892, after a very successful exhibition in Paris, the dealer Siegfried Bing took over the exclusive distribution of his works for the entire continent and thus contributed to Tiffany's fame in Europe.
Alfred J. Manning
The New York architect Alfred J. Manning worked for RH Robertson since 1884 and became its corporate partner in 1887. Together they worked on the New York Central Railroad station in the Bronx , on the renovation of the New York Club on Fifth Avenue and on a row of houses in Brooklyn . Around 1900 Manning set up his own architecture office and worked in New York until 1914.
As early as the 1870s, Robertson had worked with architects George B. Post, Edward Tuckerman Potter, and William Appleton Potter, who worked regularly with Tiffany. For example, Post designed the Manufacturers and Liberal Arts Building , which contained a Tiffany-designed chapel for the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893 . Manning lived in the New York suburb of Irvington , where the Tiffany family owned a summer home and the architect's office. It was through these channels that Manning got in touch with Tiffany and later worked with him, among other things, on a reading room in the Irvington Public Library. In 1905 Manning designed a 44-room castle known as Rochroane in Irvington for Melchior S. Belthoover, who worked in the oil industry. A Tiffany window that was originally installed in the castle can now be seen in the Corning Museum of Glass .
Manning's other assignments included Washington Irving High School in Tarrytown and EJ Nathan's summer residence in Elberon, New Jersey , which was featured in the October 1905 issue of Homes and Garden magazine .
Frederick Ayer
Frederick and Ellen Barrows Ayer were clearly involved in the decision to hire Louis Comfort Tiffany. Ayer (1822–1918) had amassed considerable financial assets in his professional life as a businessman and investor, which he had earned in the pharmaceutical, haberdashery , textiles, railways, sewer construction, mining and real estate industries . The family was a celebrity in Lowell, Massachusetts , where Frederick Ayer had built an impressive Second Empire house on Pawtucket Street . His brother James Cook Ayer ran a company that sold patented pharmaceuticals and in which Frederick was also employed.
In the course of his work, he traveled extensively across the United States to expand the sales area. A brochure from the Ayer Company dating from 1883 contains texts in French , German , Dutch , Swedish , Norwegian , Finnish , Spanish , Italian , Bohemian , Welsh and Hawaiian , demonstrating the company's foresight towards European immigrants as a customer group as well as the efforts to expand into Europe. A plaque from the JC Ayer Company can still be found on the building of the same name on Middle Street in Lowell.
Shortly after marrying his second wife, Ellen Barrows Banning, he toured Europe, North Africa and the Middle East with her and their four children . During this two-year trip from 1896 to 1898, they collected a wide variety of furnishings and art objects that they brought with them to their new home in Boston and from the design of which Tiffany was inspired for his orientalist work.
In April 1899, Ayer purchased three lots on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston . In December he chose Manning as his architect and devoted a lot of time himself to assisting with the planning of the details. His wife was also involved in the planning and was presumably primarily responsible for the theatrical entrance hall.
Use of the building
The Frederick Ayer Mansion has been used in various ways since Ayer's death in 1918 and the second floor above the second floor has been partially radically converted by subsequent owners. In the 1940s, 16 rooms in the house were rented out as a doctor's office ; Back Bay was a popular address for Boston doctors at the time. In 1953 the building was acquired by an insurance company together with the neighboring house and used as an office building. The Hearthstone Insurance Company finally sold it in 1964 to the current owners, the Trimount Foundation and Bayridge Residence and Cultural Center . From 1971 to 1972 the Frederick Ayer Mansion was structurally connected to the neighboring building and has served as a student residence ever since.
See also
- List of entries on the National Register of Historic Places in northern Boston
- List of National Historic Landmarks in Boston
literature
- Leslie Donovan, Bernard Zirnheld, Carolyn Pitts, Patty Henry: National Historic Landmark Nomination. (PDF) National Park Service , March 24, 2003, accessed April 19, 2016 .
- The Ayer Mansion. Campaign for the Ayer Mansion, Inc., 2016, accessed April 19, 2016 .
- Meghan E. Irons: Tiffany mansion a jewel in the Back Bay. In: The Boston Globe . June 19, 2010, accessed April 19, 2016 .
- Christopher Muter: Tiffany's last stand: The Ayer Mansion gets a makeover. In: The Boston Globe . November 6, 2013, accessed April 19, 2016 (English, paid article).
Web links
- Frederick Ayer Mansion in the Geographic Names Information System of the United States Geological Survey
- Official website - Campaign for the Ayer Mansion
- Official Website - Bayridge Residence and Cultural Center
Individual evidence
- ↑ cf. Donovan et al., P. 22.
- ^ A b Listing of National Historic Landmarks by State: Massachusetts. National Park Service , accessed August 4, 2019.
- ↑ a b Entry Frederick Ayer Mansion in the National Register Information System . National Park Service , accessed June 21, 2016
- ↑ a b Entry Back Bay Historic District on the National Register Information System . National Park Service , accessed June 21, 2016
- ↑ a b c d cf. Donovan et al., P. 4.
- ↑ a b c cf. Donovan et al., P. 5.
- ↑ a b c d cf. Donovan et al., P. 6.
- ↑ a b cf. Donovan et al., P. 7.
- ↑ a b c d e cf. Donovan et al., P. 8.
- ^ The Neustadt Collection of Tiffany Glass. Retrieved April 25, 2016 .
- ↑ a b cf. Donovan et al., P. 9.
- ↑ a b cf. Donovan et al., Pp. 9 f.
- ↑ a b cf. Donovan et al., P. 10.
- ↑ cf. Donovan et al., P. 11.
- ↑ a b c d cf. Donovan et al., P. 13.
- ↑ a b c cf. Donovan et al., P. 17.
- ↑ a b c d cf. Donovan et al., P. 18.
- ↑ cf. Donovan et al., P. 19.