In suburban Philadelphia, art and industry are joined in a residence commissioned in 1901
Bringing an Old house back to life
By MARGARET NOWELL; from The Magazine ANTIQUES, February 1945. There are few more worth-while experiences than bringing back to life an old house. This is what Mr. and Mrs. John Howard Joynt have done with the handsome brick house at 601 Duke Street in Alexandria, Virginia. Fig. 1-The house, with its gray brick wall, encloses two sides of the property, and overlooks …
From the Archives: Philadelphia Empire furniture by Antoine Gabriel Quervelle
The design legacy of Antoine Gabriel Quervelle
A desk associated with George Washington
By JOAN SAYERS BROW; from The Magazine ANTIQUES May 1978. The handsome slant-front desk illustrated here was originally owned by Colonel George William Fairfax (1724-1787), whose estate, Bevoir, was near Mount Vernon on the Potomac River in Virginia. In April 1773 Fairfax took his wife, sally Cary, to England, after asking his neighbor George Washington to watch over Belvoir while they were …
Spirit Feel: A New Orleans Collection
Photography by Richard Sexton | from The Magazine ANTIQUES, January/February 2013 | Africa feels close in New Orleans. You hear it in the blue notes and polyrhythmic drumming of jazz. You taste it in the okra-laden gumbos and rice dishes of the local cuisine. You see it in a host of traditional arts, from the richly beaded parading costumes of …
How America found its face: Portrait miniatures in the New Republic
By Elle Shushan; from The Magazine ANTIQUES, April 2009. The stunning events of July 1804 were almost unfathomable for the citizens of the new American republic. One Founding Father had fatally wounded another. Alexander Hamilton was dead and Aaron Burr would be indicted for murder. The duel and its aftermath marked a turning point in American culture. Fig. 17. Thomas Cole …
Sparkle Plenty
from The Magazine ANTIQUES, July/August 2012 | Tinsel paintings are reverse paintings on glass with crinkled, embossed, or smooth metallic foil applied behind translucent and unpainted areas. The effect is one of shimmering highlights when caught in the reflection of candle- or gaslight. The use of other reflective materials such as mother-of-pearl led to tinsel paintings sometimes being called Oriental, crystal, or …
The Bixby House
from The Magazine ANTIQUES, January/February 2012 | Largely unheralded, this Kansas City masterwork of modernism deserves its place in the pantheon of great American houses. Fig. 1. View of the entrance hall from the main stair in a 1937 photograph by R. B. Churchill. Except as noted, the photographs and renderings illustrated are in the Kem Weber Archive, Architecture and …
Museum accessions, part 2
This short list of notable acquisitions began with a request to decorative arts curators in major American museums to choose and discuss a favorite recent gift or purchase. The design of this elegant Gothic revival center table is attributed to the renowned Alexander Jackson Davis. The leading advocate for the “pointed style” in the United States in the mid-nineteenth century, …
American artists as they saw themselves
November 2009 | In The American School (Fig. 1) Matthew Pratt portrays himself seated at his easel, the sharp profile of his head silhouetted against the canvas, which bears his signature at bottom left. Holding a palette and maulstick to steady his hand, Pratt presents himself as a painter—an astonishing act of bravado as he had just arrived in England …