Spencer and Katrina Trask spent the summer of 1906 on Clay Island, a small island just offshore of Bolton Landing in Lake George. The Trasks used Clay Island as an escape from the endless stream of extravagant house parties at their grand mansion in…

While the Adirondacks had once been considered “one unbroken wilderness” and an exceptionally harsh environment, the rise of the Massachusetts Transcendentalists in the two decades prior to the American Civil War changed the public perception of…

Upon the completion of the reconstructed Yaddo Mansion in 1893, Spencer and Katrina Trask sought to furnish their new home with all the trappings of an English Tudor country estate as well as all the comforts of a modern American home. The Great Hall…

Located on the first floor of the Yaddo Mansion, the spacious Music Room is one of the primary social spaces at Yaddo. Following the communal dinner and the end of quiet hours, artists in residence are free to explore the rooms of the estate. For…

Although it is now the site of vacant office spaces, income-adjusted apartments, and a lone optometrist, the Woolworth Building was once a bustling department store. In 1873, Frank Winfield Woolworth, a Rodman, New York resident and future…

The Roycroft Campus of East Aurora, New York, is home to beautiful buildings, sublime artwork, and iconic furniture. Finding the inn, the print shop, or the copper shop requires little effort. But the stable, which is now home to the Roycroft Inn and…

Though the Shakers at Mount Lebanon attempted to separate themselves from the world geographically, socially, and religiously, their celibate lifestyle required them to look to the outside world for new members. As early as 1781, Shaker missionaries…

Lost among overgrown vegetation and structural ruins, the grounds surrounding White Pines were once home to magnificent gardens that titillated all of the senses in a beautiful and practical way. Ralph Radcliffe Whitehead cultivated two gardens at…