Architectural, Cultural sights in USA
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Houmas House
In the 1940s members of the same Crozat family that salvaged Bocage Plantation also purchased Houmas House, 2 miles downriver. The original structure, built in the 1790s, now forms the back end of the main Greek-revival house, built in 1840. In its heyday, this plantation controlled 150,000 acres of sugarcane, covering towns of today up to 8 miles away. Most of the furnishings are not original to the house, but the current owner (and resident), Kevin Kelly, has collected some fine period antiques to fill in. Check out the fascinating 1800s map of plantation plats found in the house. As you tour the wonderfully landscaped gardens, keep a look out for decedents of Princess …
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University of Chicago
Some universities collect football championships. The University of Chicago collects Nobel Prizes – 80-plus so far and counting. In particular, the economics department has been a regular winner. Merton Miller, a U of C economics faculty member and a prize winner himself, explained the string of wins to the Sun-Times: ‘It must be the water; it certainly can’t be the coffee.’
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Pittock Mansion
The grand Pittock Mansion was built in 1914 by Henry Pittock, who revitalized the Portland-based Oregonian newspaper. It's worth visiting the (free) grounds just to check out the spectacular views - bring a picnic.
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Ringling Museum Complex
Who doesn't love the circus? Well...people who are afraid of clowns. But a little coulrophobia isn't necessarily a deal-breaker at the Ringling Museum Complex. On the grounds of the 66-acre complex are three separate museums, all included in your admission and each one a worthy attraction on its own. Railroad, real-estate and circus baron John Ringling and his wife Mabel put down roots here, building a Venetian Gothic waterfront mansion called Ca d'Zan. You can wander the ground floor at your own pace, or take a guided tour - totally worth it - which grants you access to the upstairs bedrooms. Also on the grounds, the John & Mabel Museum of Art is an excellent art museum …
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Graceland
In the spring of 1957, the already-famous 22-year-old spent $100,000 on a Colonial-style mansion called Graceland. Priscilla Presley (who divorced Elvis in 1973) opened Graceland to tours in 1982, and now millions come here to pay homage to the King and gawk at the infamous decor. The King himself had the place redecorated in 1974; with a 15ft couch, fake waterfall, yellow vinyl walls and green shag-carpet ceiling - it's a virtual textbook of ostentatious '70s style. Elvis died here in 1977, killed by heart failure in the upstairs bathroom. Throngs of fans still weep at his grave, next to the swimming pool out back.
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Robie House
This masterpiece is the ultimate expression of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie School style, and it’s often listed among the most important structures in American architecture. The low horizontal planes and dramatic cantilevers were meant to mirror the Midwestern landscape, and they’re ornamented solely by the exquisite stained- and leaded-glass doors and windows. At the time of research the house was undergoing extensive restoration, which had disrupted the tour schedule, so call ahead.
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El Prado
El Prado. Originally built for the 1915-16 Panama-California Exposition, these Spanish colonial buildings are particularly beautiful in the morning and evening. The original exposition halls, which were mostly constructed out of stucco, chicken wire, plaster, hemp and horsehair, were only meant to be temporary. However, they proved so popular that, over the years, they have been gradually replaced with durable concrete replicas.
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Camron-Stanford House
In the late 19th century, Lake Merritt was lined with fine homes, only one of which remains: the 1876 Camron-Stanford House . You can take a tour on the second and third Wednesday (11:00 to 16:00) and on the third Sunday (13:00 to 17:00) each month. But the best aspect of the house is really its wonderful lakeside setting and the hint it gives of how Oakland looked in its Victorian heyday, which can be admired from the sidewalk.
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Mercer-Williams House
Consider seeing the Mercer-Williams House. Although Jim Williams, the Savannah art dealer portrayed by Kevin Spacey in the film version of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, died back in 1990, his infamous mansion didn't become a museum until 2004. You're not allowed to see the upstairs, where Williams' family still lives, but the downstairs is an interior decorator's fantasy.
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Yukon cabin
A replica of Jack London's Yukon cabin stands in an awkward spot near a parking lot at the eastern end of the square. It's supposedly built from the timbers of a cabin London lived in during the Yukon gold rush, though many of the original materials had to be replaced during reconstruction. Another worthwhile stop, adjacent to the old cabin, is Heinhold's First & Last Chance Saloon.
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Cliff House
At the north end of Ocean Beach, the recently rebuilt and sadly soulless Cliff House overlooks the splendid ruin of Sutro Baths, where Victorian dandies once converged for bracing baths and workouts.
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1712 Ebenezer Clough House
Behind the Paul Revere Mall in the North End. Ebenezer Clough, a Sons of Liberty member who participated in the Boston Tea Party, was a mason who worked on the adjacent Old North Church.
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Woodruff-Fontaine House
The grand 1870 Woodruff-Fontaine House, which carefully preserves Victorian clothing and furnishings.
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Queen Emma Summer Palace
Queen Emma was a consort of Kamehameha IV and her summer palace is now open to the public as an historic house museum. Emma was three-quarters royal Hawaiian and a quarter English. She was a granddaughter of the captured British sailor John Young, who became a friend and adviser to Kamehameha I. The house is also known as Hanaiakamalama, the name of John Young's home in Kawaihae on the Big Island, where he served as governor.
The Youngs left the luxurious home to Queen Emma, who often slipped away from her more formal downtown home to spend time at this retreat - a bit like an old Southern plantation house - columned porch, high ceilings and louvered windows catching the …
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Winchester Mystery House
The billboards up and down every highway in California may have triggered your tourist-trap alarm, but Winchester Mystery House is a bona fide curiosity. It's a ridiculous Victorian mansion with 160 rooms of various sizes (many of them utterly useless), dead-end hallways and a staircase that runs up to a ceiling all jammed together like a child's build-a-house game.
The woman responsible for it is Sarah Winchester, heir of the Winchester rifle fortune, who, beginning in 1884, spent 38 years building this sprawling mansion because the spirits of those killed by her husband's guns told her to do so. Apparently no expense was spared in the construction and the extreme result…
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Cades Cove
A cove, in Appalachian parlance, means a valley, but Cades Cove is far more than that. Many consider this special place to be a national treasure, thanks to its poignant cultural legacy, telling pioneer architecture and plentiful wildlife. And then there's the landscape itself, lush green fields enveloped by an unbroken expanse of mountains. It's no wonder so many families return year after year.
The first settlers - most of English, Scotch-Irish and Welsh stock - arrived in the 1820s. By 1850 the valley's population had swelled to its peak of 70 households and 451 residents. Today, thanks to the excellent preservation efforts of the NPS, you can still get a vivid sense …
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Rough Point
In 1889, Frederick W Vanderbilt built Rough Point in the tradition of English manorial estates on a rocky piece of land jutting out into the ocean. Later purchased by the tobacco baron, James B Duke, the mansion fell into the hands of Duke’s only daughter, Doris (aged 13 years). She left the estate to the Newport Restoration Society upon her death. While the splendor of the grounds alone is worth the price of admission, Rough Point also houses much of Doris Duke’s impressive art holdings, including medieval tapestries, furniture owned by French emperors, Ming Dynasty ceramics, and paintings by Renoir and Van Dyck. These and other extraordinary objects formed the backdrop …
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Casa Elián
The surreal house of Elián Gonzales, subject of one of the most bitter international custody battles of the 1990s, is a shrine, a time capsule and an exercise in the creation of public iconography. Since 2001, the house has become a temple to the symbology of the most anti-Castro Cuban exile politics. The little property is scattered with homages to Jesus, American flags and images of Elian himself, who is all but explicitly labeled a little saint of his people.
Elián's great-uncle Delfin bought the house in late 2000 and then froze time inside: Elian's clothes hang in the closet, the inner tube that saved his life at sea hangs on the wall and his Spiderman pajamas are l…
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1850 House Museum
The 1850 House is one of the apartments in the lower Pontalba Building. Madame Micaëla Pontalba, daughter of Don Andrés Almonaster y Roxas, built the long rows of red-brick apartments flanking the upper and lower portions of Jackson Sq. Initial plans for the apartments were drawn by the noted architect James Gallier Sr. In 1927, the lower Pontalba Building was bequeathed by William Ratcliffe Irby to the Louisiana State Museum, and three years later the city acquired the upper Pontalba Building, where Micaëla once lived. Today, knowledgeable volunteers from the Friends of the Cabildo give tours of the apartment (every 45 minutes or so), which includes the central court and…
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Jefferds’ Tavern Visitor Center
Historic York was called Agamenticus by its pre-colonial Native American inhabitants. British colonials settled York in 1624, and it was chartered as a city in 1641. The Old York Historical Society is proud of the town’s historic buildings and has preserved several of them as a museum of the town’s history. The historic buildings include the School House, dating from the mid-18th century. The Old Gaol (jail) gives a vivid impression of crime and punishment two centuries ago. The Emerson-Wilcox House is a museum of New England decorative arts and the Elizabeth Perkins House was a wealthy family’s summer home. The John Hancock warehouse preserves the town’s industrial…
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Kilohana Plantation
Amid sprawling, manicured lawns, Kilohana Plantation is now a tourist magnet featuring Gaylord's restaurant, estate tours and one-stop upscale shopping. Sugar baron Gaylord Parke Wilcox, once the head honcho of Grove Farm Homestead, built the house in 1935. Trivia buffs take note: the Wilcox family was the model for James Michener's famous epic, Hawaii.
The 15,000-sq-ft Tudor-style mansion has been painstakingly restored and its legacy as one of Kaua'i's distinguished historic houses is unquestioned. Antique-filled rooms and Oriental carpets laid over hardwood floors lead you past cases of poi pounders, koa bowls and other Hawaiiana to a row of gallery shops.
Clydesdale ho…
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Old York Buildings & Historical Society
Historic York was called Agamenticus by its pre-colonial Native American inhabitants. British colonials settled York in 1624, and it was chartered as a city in 1641. The Old York Historical Society is proud of the town’s historic buildings and has preserved several of them as a museum of the town’s history. The historic buildings include the School House, dating from the mid-18th century. The Old Gaol (jail) gives a vivid impression of crime and punishment two centuries ago. The Emerson-Wilcox House is a museum of New England decorative arts and the Elizabeth Perkins House was a wealthy family’s summer home. The John Hancock warehouse preserves the town’s industrial…
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Destrehan Plantation
Start your day at the oldest plantation home remaining in the lower Mississippi Valley, Destrehan Plantation, only 12 miles from New Orleans International Airport. Indigo was the principal crop in 1787 when Antoine Robert Robin DeLongy commissioned the original French colonial–style mansion, using bousillage (mud- and straw-filled) walls supported by cypress timbers. The house features a distinctive African-style hipped roof, no doubt a tip of the hat to the builder’s ancestry. When DeLongy’s daughter, Celeste, married Jean Noel Destrehan, they added the present Greek-revival facade. Costumed docents lead tours through the graceful home where the pirate Jean Lafitte was…
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Cà d'Zan
Said to mean 'House of John' in Venetian dialect, Cà d'Zan (1924-26) was the grand winter home of the Ringlings. Fronting Sarasota Bay, it's a spectacular combination of Italian and French Renaissance, baroque, Venetian Gothic and modern architecture. The lavish house has a ballroom, dining room, and taproom (with vaulted ceilings and stained-glass panels); the ballroom and playroom had their ceilings painted by Willy Pogany, a set designer for the Ziegfeld Follies.
There's a catwalk around the 30ft-high court, or living room, with very fine tapestries throughout. In fact, the whole stupendous place is filled with eclectic and opulent decorative arts and furnishings. It …
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Stephen Hopkins House
Immediately east of downtown Providence, you’ll find College Hill, where you can see the city’s colonial history reflected in the multihued 18th-century houses that line Benefit Street on the East Side. These are, for the most part, private homes, but many are open for tours one weekend in mid-June during the annual Festival of Historic Homes. Benefit St is a fitting symbol of the Providence renaissance, rescued by local preservationists in the 1960s from misguided urban-renewal efforts that would have destroyed it. Its treasures range from the 1708 Stephen Hopkins House, named for the ten-time governor and Declaration of Independence signer, to the clean Greek Reviva…
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