You need to plan ahead, way ahead, to attend a tour of this legendary property in New Canaan, Connecticut. On a warm, sunny Saturday, nearly a year after I reserved tickets, my mother and I arrived at the downtown Glass House Visitor Center to embark on the tour. With my camera around my neck, I was informed at the front desk that photography would not be permitted during our visit. (I’ve since learned that tickets at a much steeper price allow their bearers to take pictures.) My disappointment was somewhat alleviated when the ticket taker gave us each an unexpected perk, a packet of 4 1/2 inch x 6 1/2 inch flashcards illustrated with images relating to the property on one side and explanatory information on the other. They were cleverly secured with a wide, silver rubber band, labeled “THE GLASS HOUSE” in elegant, black letters. My mother whispered to me that the rubber bands alone were worth the price of admission. Clearly she had pretty low expectations; she isn’t shy about dismissing Modernism.

We loaded into a van with eight others. Our tour mates had ordered tickets a year in advance too and were likely as determined as we were to see what the fuss is all about. Our guide, a pleasant grandmotherly type, in sensible shoes and a floppy hat, sat up front. She was a far cry from the young, fit, male guide, dressed in black, with thick-rimmed, fashion-forward glasses that you might imagine would lead such a tour. She was, however, a well-cast emissary for Modernism, setting the stage for a surprisingly non-threatening, intriguing, and even warm aesthetic. In several documentaries I’ve seen Philip Johnson do much the same.

A short ride later we came upon the property. You enter between tall brown, concrete pylons (which my mother described as tombstones) and below an enormous aluminum bar, triggered remotely, that travels vertically between the pylons. To me the gate felt like a retro vision of the future, which I suppose it was.

Click to read more ...

Recommended upcoming New England tours

Nantucket Christmas Stroll Annual Holiday House Tour (Nantucket, MA) Friday, November 30, 2007 4:00-7:00 pm (Call for ticket info 508.228.7285 ext. 1168); Architectural Walking Tour, Saturday, December 1, 2007 9:30-11:00 am and 1:00-2:00 pm (Call for reservations 508.228.1387)

21^st Annual Friends of Nashua Symphony Holiday House Tour (Nashua, NH) Saturday and Sunday, December 1 and 2, 2007 12:00 pm-4:00pm

Plymouth Holiday House Tour (Plymouth, MA) Saturday and Sunday, December 1 and 2, 2007 11:00 am-4:30 pm

Christmas in Salem (Salem, MA) Saturday, December 1, 2007 10:00 am-4:00 pm and Sunday, December 2, 2007 11:30 am-4:30 pm

Stockbridge Holiday House Tour (Stockbridge, MA) Saturday, December 1, 2007 11:00 am-4:00 pm

Newburyport Holiday House Tour (Newburyport, MA) Saturday, December 8, 2007 10:00 am

Essex Holiday House Tour (Essex, CT) Saturday, December 8, 2007 10:00 am-4:00 pm

Bristol Home for the Holiday house tour (Bristol, RI) Saturday and Sunday, December 8 and 9, 2007 12:00 pm-5:00 pm

Woodstock Holiday House Tour (Woodstock, VT) Saturday, December 8, 2007 10:00 am-4:00pm

Stratford Historic Holiday House Tour and Boutique (Stratford, CT) Sunday, December 9, 2007 12:00 pm

Imagine disassembling an antique house of roughly 5000 square feet in southeastern China’s Anhui province, shipping it to the eastern United States, then preserving and reassembling it in Salem, Massachusetts. Sound unlikely? Well, that’s how Yin Yu Tang, the Chinese house at Salem’s Peabody Essex Museum, got here. The Yin Yu Tang that you tour today in Salem stood originally for two-hundred years in the rural village of Huang Cun in the Huizhou region where it housed a merchant’s family for generations.

Click to read more ...

This 1938 Modernist landmark home designed by Walter Gropius
view of front (of Bauhaus fame) for his family in Lincoln, Massachusetts is surprising. In its time it was lauded by architectural critics and academia as hot, cutting-edge design. Today, well, touring the house reminds me of discovering at your twentieth high school reunion that the cool guys who were so intimidating, vigorous, and full of bluster as teenagers are now tired, balding, and completely benign.

Click to read more ...

With an impressive array of 20 buildings of various function, shape, and size, the Hancock Shaker Village in Pittsfield, Massachusetts is a slice of Shaker heaven -- architectural heaven that is. I have a natural affinity for antiques; I grew up in an early 1800’s colonial with an old dilapidated barn out back. Yet I think the spare, simple forms of these Shaker gems speak to those with Modernist upbringings as well. The Shakers espoused a purity of self and spirit that manifested itself in a purity of form and function, free of unnecessary ornament or complication.

Click to read more ...