Divine Houses

I have been privileged to see a few fine houses this summer, ones that are open to the public such as this one, the Glensheen mansion in Duluth, Minnesota. I was agog at the splendid interiors and totally forgot to take photos, but here you can see the facade that faces the lake, brick covering thick concrete and steel walls. This house will be standing a long time.

Glensheen is the home of a family that made its wealth from buying and selling shares of iron ore mines in the iron range of Minnesota. The house itself is named from "glen," meaning between two rivers, and "sheen," for the light effects of sun on the water of Lake Superior.

Views of the lake are seen from the many windows facing east. The house has beautiful original furnishings, woodwork, stone and tile work from the arts and crafts era of design circa 1906.

Another fine house in neighboring Superior, Wisconsin, is Fairlawn.

 

This mansion was built with profits from the lumber industry. Its style is from a bit earlier period - it is a Victorian. Not too many of the furnishings are original, but the fireplaces with their tile, stone and even silver surrounds and the woodwork in cherry, oak, bird's eye maple and mahogany is beautiful, I thought. And I thought, in good taste, probably because now, as a museum, the number of objects that Victorians loved to fill their homes is reduced. Less cluttered now, the details can be admired.

Here is the Fairlawn parlor. Notice the fireplace on the right. It has silver trim around the opening and a surround of an exotic stone. Now notice the stained glass above the mantle. A window above a fireplace? That means the chimney needs to divide into two flues. What extravagance!











The window I found to be exceptionally beautiful with soft shades of glass to match the room's light color scheme.

The parlor space extends into the first story of the tower. This light-filled alcove is perfect for this graceful sculpture of Persephone in pure, white marble. She is nearly life-size.

On the third floor of the tower there is this iron spiral staircase leading to the topmost level. From there you can see Barker's Island, Pine Point in Duluth, Lake Superior beyond that, and just below, a garden circle on the front lawn.

Barker's Island was created when a rival of this house's owner vengefully dumped stinking sludge from a canal he was dredging right in whiffing distance of Fairlawn. Now it is a marina and smells just fine, but once - not nice.





































Earlier this summer while reuniting with pals at the Jersey shore, we visited the studio and home of John F. Peto in Island Heights, New Jersey. Built in 1889 designed by the artist and owner himself, it is now a museum furnished in the arts and crafts style, as it would have been when he lived there at the turn of the century. Some rooms are specified for art exhibitions. While we were there, the international Peto Biennial was on display.

Peto was a trompe l'oiel painter who used his skill to paint in one of the rooms, a shelf holding books and other objects. Trompe l'oiel artists trick the eye by painting life-size still life objects as realistically as possible. There may be more wall paintings to be discovered in the house that subsequent owners painted over.

This is more humble living, not nearly so grand as Glensheen or Fairlawn, but saturated colors and country furnishings with personal meaning help to make it nevertheless a wonderful dwelling to visit. The paint colors are identical to Peto's original ones thanks to preservationists. They uncovered years of accumulated paint to reveal a swatch of the first layer, and reproduced it in fresh paint.

All these three houses were toured with a knowledgable guide, in the case of the mansions, college students on summer break, and at the Peto studio, the curator of exhibits, a permanent employee, led us through. We learn, we appreciate, it's fun - more interesting than I expected in each case.