As much as I cannot fathom growing up in these living museums during the Gilded Age, I am so thankful they have been preserved for us to masquerade in their world for a day or two.
An Incredible New England Itinerary. Connecticut Bucket List Destinations. Ah yes, the Gilded Age. The time in America where new wealth accumulated from generation to generation creating an era of exuberant extravagance. Yet they were built for one family to be used six weeks out of the year. Elaborate wild parties that lasted for days with intricate planning and grandiose theatrics. Scott Fitzgerald. The biggest question we had in planning our visit was which Newport mansions to tour and if it was possible to see them all in one day.
Built from , the Breakers totals , square feet in area. The Elms is one of the most popular Newport mansions and is located on Bellevue Avenue. Built for Edward Julius Berwind, a coal baron, the mansion was designed by Horace Trumbauer and completed in It has a grand exterior set upon impressive grounds, and a particularly opulent entrance hall and staircase. The Elms was very sophisticated technologically; it was one of the first American homes to be wired for electricity, and it also had one of the earliest electrical ice makers.
Rosecliff was built between and by Nevada silver heiress Theresa Fair Oelrichs. The mansion was modeled after the Grand Trianon of Versailles by architect Stanford White, and its central point of focus is its grand ballroom, the largest in Newport.
At 40 X 80 ft, this ballroom is flanked by columns and french doors, with views looking out over the ocean. Until the Vanderbilts constructed their lavish mansions, Chateau-sur-Mer was the grandest in Newport, and played host to any number of parties. Just a decade after the home was finished, William Shepard Wetmore passed away and George Peabody Wetmore became the new owner.
This mansion has many interesting features, including its 3-storey great hall with a 45 high ceiling and sweeping balconies. The original owner was a Florida plantation owner named George Noble Jones, who had architect Richard Upjohn design the home in the Gothic Revival style.
In , Kingscote was sold to the King family, who would go on to make some architectural adaptations with the help of Stanford White in the s. Cotton broker and investor Isaac Bell, Jr.
Hunter House is an important historic home in Newport, and nearly years older than the Gilded Age mansions in the city. It was then that a the building became a formal Georgian mansion with its large central hall.
From there it passed through a number of different owners. The house is a fantastic look into the 18th century in Newport. The architect was George Champlin Mason, who was responsible for building numerous mansions in Newport during the Gilded Age. Though the original owner of the property was Edmund Schermerhorn, Chepstow passed to the Morris family in , where it remained until it was donated to The Preservation Society in Instead, it is owned by the Newport Restoration Foundation.
This makes sense since Doris Duke founded the organization and was also the owner of the Rough Point Mansion. Its original gardens were designed by the firm of Frederick Law Olmsted.
In , the property was bought by James Buchanan Duke, but when he died 3 years later, his homes and fortune were inherited by his daughter Doris Duke. An earlier villa, Chepstow, though completed in , might also have passed muster with James. In the s, the firm designed the Isaac Bell House, an interesting visit these days because it's being presented as a work of restoration in progress.
For far and away the nuttiest experience, head over to Belcourt Castle, designed by Richard Morris Hunt to resemble a French hunting lodge at thrice or more the scale. Run-down and still in the hands of the let's just say "peculiar" family that purchased it decades ago, Belcourt is in many ways the anti-Newport mansion, a little bit Grey Gardens, a little bit The Munsters, and anything but too manicured.
In its heyday it was a major party palace, but now it's the scene of ghost tours. Whether it's haunted or not I cannot say, but it's nothing if not atmospheric.
All the mansions mentioned above are maintained by the Preservation Society of Newport County www. How to Choose a Newport Mansion Skip to next paragraph. Travel Home.
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