A Sculptor from Brandywine and More

Last posting, I promised a post about Andre Harvey, the renown Brandywine sculptor. While searching for his information, I stumbled across articles about Renny Reynolds, also a renown floral designer.  Since spring is in the air, I thought a posting about both men would be appropriate today.  First - Andre Harvey.

A photo of the sculptor himself (from Brandywine by Anthony Edgewood).  If you believe the pig his arm is resting upon is real, it is not of course, but one of his fabulous sculptures.

This pig, another of Harvey's sculptures, resides outside the Brandywine River Museum where it welcomes visitors.  What is it about pigs and Brandywine? Jamie Wyeth paints them, Andre Harvey sculpts them.  Whatever it is, the results are exquisite.

The sculptor's home.  The Pennsylvania exterior stonework does not show very well here, but his woody station wagon does.  (The above photo and the following ones are from Southern Accents, March-April, 1993.)

The entrance to his home.  Notice the beautiful hardware on the door and the frog sculpture in the distance.

The settee in the same foyer with his possum sculpture hanging above.

The "spare beauty" of the stairway with a goat sculpture atop an antique table.

The artist working on a much larger goat sculpture.

Turtles clamber on the dining room table and an armadillo, entitled The Relic, stands atop an English oak William and Mary highboy.  I so love highboys, armadillos not so much but sculpted ones are fine.

Living room of the artist with a ubiquitous pig sitting near the hearth.  Love the paneling in this room.  My sons tell me the paneling in my living room cries out to be similar to this, while I maintain ours needs to remain a simpler paneling.

Thus ends our visit to Andre Henry.  Wish I had more photos to show you, but this is all of them from my files.

Now onto Renny Reynolds's home in Pennsylvania.  Reynolds designs most of his floral projects in the New York City area, but comes to this "farm" in Pennsylvania to relax.  I think you'll see why.  (The following photos are from House Beautiful, March 1993.)

From the moment I saw this dining room in House Beautiful, I loved it - the massive fireplace, the sconces above it, the comfortable chairs, even his sweet dog.

Both of the above photos are of the living room. Don't you love the paint color of the paneling here and that narrow table in front of the sofa?  The topiary in the window must be one of Reynolds's designs.

Now some outside photos of the house and flora and fauna.

My resolution on this photo does not do justice to that wonderful Pennsylvania stone design.  (I need photoshop.)

Doesn't this seem like a great place to unwind?  So ends the photos from this article from House Beautiful, but I found more.  I'm sorry to say, unlike me, I tore the following photos from their original magazine, but I believe it was another House Beautiful article.  They include images of Reynolds's "potting shed" made from the barn on the property. Let's take a look.

Now, I have a potting shed and I have garden books on shelves in my den, but this building is something really special.

More of the grounds which make me long for summer, although spring is definitely in the air in upstate New York.

 I have not forgotten that  my blog is supposed to be more about kitchens, and I know I keep promising that they will appear.  So, today I will end with two kitchens, both of them in Pennsylvania.  

The above photo is from Colonial Homes, January-February 1987.  It has that Pennsylvania feel and its rooms and its kitchen are pretty classic.

 I like this house and many of its antiques shown in the photos above, but, not to be too critical, it is just too cluttered.  Could be a sign of its era.  Today, I do not think photographers would stage these rooms the same way.

On to what I think may be a kitchen more like today's, but still containing an atmosphere from the past.

So what do you think, my dear reader?  Too cluttered?  Too outdated?  While I like these rooms, I do not love them as I do the Brandywine rooms discussed in previous posts.  I think they lack the spareness which attracts me more and more as you will see when my journey continues next time.

-b

Still in Pennsylvania but forward Twenty Years

So many beautiful homes exist in this part of the country, it is difficult to leave Pennsylvania when I keep finding more beautiful homes to talk about.  Lauren Sara, designer of stylish maternity clothes and author of Expecting Style,  purchased this Colonial Revival when it was covered in "vines and weeds."  Unlike the Wyeths and Frolic Weymouth, she "gutted the interior."  She wanted a "loftlike space" in which to showcase her American folkart and beautiful antiques, and she succeeds as the photos from  Architectural Digest, June 2006, reveal.

The exterior is Pennsylvania stone, typical of so many houses in the area as seen from my previous posts.  Of the six or seven fantasy houses I would own, a Pennsylvania stone one would definitely find a place in my collection.  They look so early and have those wonderful deep windows inside.  (A girl can dream.)

So what do you think?  Do you like this spare feel?  Surprisingly, I like it very much.  It has a museum quality which allows that lovely kas (a large two door cupboard, usually with some painted decor; often  of Dutch origin) to stand out.  It would be a shame to have its beauty minimized with any busyness at all.  A graduate of Parsons School of Design, Lauren "loves everything to be seamless.  She wanted white walls with no baseboards, plaster openings with minimum trim, library shelves that seem to go on for 20 feet with no visible means of support and ebonized-bamboo floors, so dark you wouldn't know they're bamboo."  Windsor chairs are great too as is the sculpture (left of the chair) made by her son when he was four.  Note the bowl atop the kas.

Here we get a glimpse of the dining room and part of the library.  Her choice of folk art really enhances the spareness of the rooms (or vice versa).  The art stands out as it never would in an overly decorated room.

A view of the library with those long bookcases and deep windows.  I always want my tables to have nothing on them, but someone always puts car keys or remotes on them.

Here Lauren Sara poses with one of her four horses.   (She even has horses!!  Just like my fantasy house would - with a stone barn and grooms to do the cleaning of stalls.  I would just do the riding off into the sunset.  Hey, this is my fantasy.)

I admire the spareness of the kitchen, but could never live with it.  I would clutter it up with garden produce and copper pots and wooden bowls.  I do love the stainless workspace though and hanging cupboard.  I do so wish I could see more.  The chairs around the table are from Lancaster County.

In the master bedroom, a very geometric, Amish quilt hangs over the bed, and the room has a fireplace.  How much do I love fireplaces in bedrooms!  Lots.  The Windsor chair here has two writing platforms, and it is believed it was to accomodate both left and right-handed writers.  Very rare.

  

Fish decoys are displayed in this bedroom, and a "1775 comb-back Windsor chair sits at a desk with and inlaid-leather blotter."  So tasteful.

"Floating shelves that Sara designed hold shoes and leather boxes in the dressing area."  (My fantasy dressing room would look like this; my reality dressing room does not.)

Love this guest room.  While the master bedroom is beautiful, the size of this one seems cozier.  The decoys on the deep window sill, the antique basket and primitive portrait are perfect.

I'm setting my next outside table with those multi-wicked pillars at one end and a spray of flowers on the other.  Looks so inviting and a little funky.  Look at that view.

Landscape designer, Edwina von Gael "convinced her client that her house didn't need the shrubs that surround most houses."  Lauren Sara "didn't need much convincing."  She thinks it now has a "quiet, regal appearance."  It really does seem regal; it has great bones.

I hope you love this house as much as I do.  So different from the homes in my earlier posts, yet it contains so many similar elements: stone exterior, authentic antiques, and elegant taste in beautiful countryside. 

If I can find the magazine I'm seeking, my next post will be about a very talented sculptor who also lives in Pennsylvania.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Leaving the Wyeths in Pennsylvania


This posting of Ann Breslford McCoy will be my last one centering around the Wyeths in Pennsylvania.  (Later, I will follow their work and homes in Maine.)  Ann, daughter of Anna Wyeth McCoy, built this house on her parents' property, but it looks as beautifully old as the antique homes viewed in my earlier  posts.  I particularly love Ann's house because it is new, but you could never tell - a quality I've tried to emulate in my own home.  As I have done with the previous postings, let's first take a look at her art.  (These paintings were taken from Wyethhurdgallery.com.)

The subject matter of this painting appears to be Maine.

Leaving Chadds  Ford

Elephant Walk

The last two paintings appear to focus on Pennsylvania subject matter.

Now to the home, my main focus here, which appeared in House Beautiful in January 1988.

If you cannot read the caption under the first photo, it mentions the painting over the mantel is of Ms. McCoy at 21 by Henriette Wyeth Hurd.  Love the antique hooked rugs in this home and the previous Wyeth homes.  Note how deep the windows are indicating the thickness of the walls.  The bookcase here is a great color.

Love, love this kitchen.  All the yellow ware on the table and the shelves is antique but used everyday  

according to Ann McCoy, and it inspired my own collection.  The fireplace is to the right above but is not shown to great advantage.  This whole kitchen reminds me a bit of the Weymouth summer kitchen in my previous post.

More hooked rugs, two paintings by her father, John McCoy, a Pennsylvania-made dower chest, and again those deep windows and bookcases.  Not shown in this image is the fireplace to the right of the window.  I'm so into cozy at this time of year, and this room personifies it.

Hope you can read the small caption under the photo.  It explains the artwork and how the floorboards were collected from old farms in the area.   Either of the ladder back chairs might have been the subject matter for Leaving Chadds Ford above.

The painting above the table was an engagement present from her father.  Art is in the lifeblood of this family.  Isn't that bowl wonderful??  And again the deep, deep windows.

Same room, more antiques, more artwork, and hog scraper candlesticks on each side of the apples in the deep window.

Even if you are not in love with antiques (I have a friend who is very Zen and has never stepped foot in an antique shop; she's probably bored to tears.), you have to love this rather spare vignette.  The wonderful, unrestored corner cupboard is the star here or is it that painting, Bluebells by Henriette Wyeth or even the hooked rug.  They're all perfect.

A young neighbor plays here with whalebone miniatures and sits at a miniature desk on a windsor chair.  "The tiny Shakespeare folios also reflect Ms. McCoy's interest in miniatures."

With this house, I end my visit to Wyeth country, but you can probably tell how much it affected me as my husband and I began building and decorating our own home.  We visited this area often and were inspired each time, but as time passes design aesthetics change.  Mine did.  Still, as I post  these images from what-did-not-seem-long-ago (until I looked at the date of the magazines), I realize how much I still admire the talent and authenticity of the Wyeth family and their art.  Taste changes but also remains the same.

Affect of the Wyeths and How Tastes Change yet Remain the Same


My son asked me the other day (because I make my children critique my blog, and sometimes regret it),
"Where are you going with this, Mom?  One blog is about kitchens, another about the Wyeths, and then kitchens again.  Isn't your blog supposed to be all about kitchens?  It's a bit confusing.  You need a time line or something."  If you too are confused, let me try to clarify - over thirty years,  in both print magazines and online websites, I've observed kitchen design change.  I've saved my favorites with piles of organized magazines and folders within folders on my computer.  So, before dwelling only on "kitchens I have loved" today, I must dwell on "kitchens (and design) I have loved" yesterday because, darn it all, so many earlier kitchens were great kitchens and have molded kitchen design into what it is today.

So let's start today with two kitchens from Colonial Homes Winter 1978.  Colonial Homes, now out of print, had a huge following in its heyday.   Both kitchens here are reminiscent of the ones from my first two posts in that they both have fireplaces and are reminiscent of the Wyeth posts in that both contain antiques.

The next three images are from Early American Life, April 1985, and contain many more of the period antiques I love.  The wing chair in the first image reminds me of some of the Belgian linen chairs of today (though I'm sure it was not linen in 1985), and the woodwork reminds me of the paneling in so many of the Wyeth interiors.

Love the fruit on the tables above and below.  The bowl in the second image here is great, and I love the primitive portrait - not a Wyeth, but old.  The fireplace could be straight out of a Wyeth interior.

Another image, another great bowl, a period highboy, a settle, a windsor chair, and another primitive portrait.  So old New England.

Skipping way ahead now to a kitchen from Architectural Digest, June 2010, we see a combination of elements from the past and the present - old beams, an island countertop and flooring from reclaimed wood.  Yet, what I love here is that these early elements are combined with today's stainless shelving, black iron pot rack, and new Viking stove.  Also note the stone work surrounding the stove area.  This kitchen really works today but contains some of the past.

The next kitchen from Southern Accents, July-August 2005, also demonstrates use of old with the new - brick flooring, old butcher block combined with Wolf stove from today and a wonderful knife block.

The kitchen below from House Beautiful, November 2010, combines a wall of reclaimed wood with a beautiful Le Cornue stove, red Kitchen Aid mixer and it works.  Love the counter full of fresh broccoli and onion mounds.

And today's last kitchen from Traditional Homes, spring 1987 issue - "Colonial Warmth" is from a Greenwich Connecticut home.  If you can enlarge the text from the article, I think it says everything I have been trying to say.  

Hope you have enjoyed these kitchens, hope I have demystified the path I am taking.  My next posting will again be about Wyeth country and its interior design.  Can you tell this family and area impacted my taste??  Please be patient, hang with me, and I hope enjoy the journey.