Este artículo complementa los datos sobre las casas de Vanderbilt que fueron fotografiadas por Albert Levy y documenta que fueron los Herther brothers los que dirigieron la decoracion de las Twin Houses, realizando directamente alguno de sus muebles.
Las revistas americanas de arquitectura esconden, entre sus páginas, datos de las casas más importantes de su tiempo, con detalle no sólo de los artistas que las hicieron si no también de muebles, pintura etc.
Al mismo tiempo, como en este caso, suelen ser una fuente fiable, digamos mejor bastante fiable, de datos pues están escritas en el mismo tiempo de la noticia.
Es una pena cuando en muchos de estas casas sus interiores esconden tesoros artísticos de Europa comprados a precio de ganga por el desprecio a la propia historia que tuvieron los europeos, por supuesto españoles incluidos, sobre nuestros monumentos que , cuando no los dejaban caer, los vendían tanto la iglesia como los particulares.
Here we should
note that it is but one of five magnificent houses recently
built by Mr.
Vanderbilt'and his two sons on Fifth Avenue, between Fifty-first
and Fifty-seventh
Streets. The last two^are widely diverse in style and plan. That of Mr. W. K.
Vanderbilt was' designed by Mr. R. M. Hunt, brother of the late William M.
Hunt, the well known painter. The material, a light gray limestone, would be
more agreeable if of a warmer tint; but it has a fine grain and is easily
carved. The style is of the Transitional, or Later Gothic, and without imitating suggests
the yet extant buildings of that period. The architect's object has been
two-fold.: -to achieve a. pyramidal effect by making his lines converge to the
central gable on the Fifth Avenue side; and while lavishly employing decorative
sculpture on his walls, so. as to mass his ornamentation as to produce a number
of wide unbroken spaces, thereby gaining in breadth and concentra tion of effect.
The residence Of
Mr, Cornelius Vanderbilt was designed by Mr. George Post, and was suggested by the
seventeenth century French chateau, with an harmonious interfusion of ideas
adapted from- the Flemish and Jacobean schools. The material employed is red
brick, with facings of gray limestone. The combination of color thus secured
is warm and agreeable?by no means an un important feature; in a climate like
that of New Yorkr' The stonework and carving are elaborate in parte; but as the
lines accentuated' on Either-side by-"a,, Jargergatble" or,: dormer
.window, : not altogether be in harmony
w^h the other forms?are simple, the design must studied to be fully
-appreciated. The interior adornments, by Messrs. Colroan & Tiffany, are
after the more recent fashion of decorative art,
The residence of
Mr. William ST Vanderbilt, the father, with , the adjoining .house built for his daughters, are,
however, the most important of the group, both in respect of dimensions and of
general design.. The plan of these houses was made by Mr. Vanderbilt himself.
The decoration, including the furnishing, was done by the Messrs. Herter
Brothers, of New York, and the construction was superintended by Mr. Snooks.
The material. employed is the rich brown freestone so common in the elegant.
mansions of New York.
The library table
is one of the finest pieces of cabinet-work ever turned out in America. It was
designed and carved in the establishment of the Messrs. Herter, and is of black
walnut, highly polished, and inlaid with mother of-pearl. The ceiling is a most
interesting feature, and serves to relieve the heaviness of the array of
monotinted woods. It is of wood carved in rustic fashion in crossbars, gilded
with dead gold.
