The intricately carved fireplace surround is the focal point. The large parlor was the main living room as well as a space to receive and entertain guests. She was an important member of the Boston School and so this was a natural fit.” “There were not many paintings by women in Historic New England’s collection and none by Hills. Together, they decided to look for paintings that were “more Tonalist and Impressionistic with an emphasis on atmosphere and light.” Carlisle called attention to a landscape dating to about 1880 by Laura Coombs Hills. Essex, Mass., dealer Andrew Spindler, who serves on HNE’s collections committee, put her in touch with Sandra Lepore of Lepore Fine Arts Gallery in Newburyport, Mass. Regarding art, no paintings belonging to the Eustis family came with the house and Carlisle found nothing appropriate in the HNE collection. “This was definitely a collaboration between the commercial and the curatorial,” Carlisle said.Įxamples of acquisitions illustrate the task-at-hand as well as the fruitfulness of these relationships. Carlisle worked with specialist dealers and consultants in the effort. More about Eustis Estate Museum’s new interpretive features in a moment, but suffice it to say for now that preparatory activities included locating antique furnishings that were both historically accurate and able to withstand use. Carlisle and her colleagues decided to “honor the original vision of the house” by installing fine and decorative arts objects that were in sympathy with its “forward-looking character for the late 1870s.” In addition, they have created a museum environment where visitors determine their own paths and experiences.
#Eustis estate museum and study center full#
A few interior photographs and snippets of family remembrances provided a bit more information, but far from the full picture. So, we are talking about three of 20-plus rooms,” Carlisle said, offering some of the backstory. Those were for the entrance hall, the dining room and one of the bedrooms. “Especially during the last 30 to 40 years, all the properties acquired by Historic New England came complete with family collections… In the case of the Eustis Estate, only some of the original furnishings were sold with the house. She told, in so many words, how she selected aesthetically powerful and temporally appropriate paintings and objects, bold reflections of late Nineteenth Century design’s eclecticism, historicism and color. The survival of only a portion of the building’s original furnishings, combined with HNE staff members’ desire to offer a more open and flexible tour experience, has led to fresh approaches for the organization founded in 1910 as the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities and currently responsible for 41 properties, 37 of which are publicly accessible.ĭescribing her role as “setting the stage for the story we wanted to tell,” Carlisle took her lead from the estate’s remarkable architecture when outfitting rooms lacking their original furnishings. It serves as the centerpiece of an 80-acre complex HNE purchased from a descendent in 2012. Built in 1878 for William Ellery Channing Eustis and his family, the manorial residence, which mingles Queen Anne and Richardsonian Romanesque style, was designed by William Ralph Emerson (1833-1917). It is a spectacular example of the Aesthetic Movement in New England,” said Nancy Carlisle, senior curator of collections at Historic New England (HNE), emphasizing the structural glory of the newly opened Eustis Estate Museum and Study Center. – “What is most compelling is the exterior and interior architecture.
Emerson sited the romantic, asymmetrical structure on a rise that afforded its occupants a 360-degree view of the landscape designed by Ernest Bowditch. Architect William Ralph Emerson, a distant cousin of the Transcendentalist, completed his plan for the Eustis House in 1878.
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