# Addendum to the Application for Inclusion of *Gilded Age Newport* in the U.S. World Heritage Tentative List

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# Part I: Response to NPS Comments

***Comment:*** Although the document evidences a great deal of work and
reads very well, the absence of well-defined national and international
comparative contexts for "Gilded Age" Newport is a paramount concern.
There is also much extraneous material related to the entire town,
whereas what is being proposed is a selection of important buildings in
one part of it.

***Response:*** **These overall concerns have been addressed through an
expansion of the Comparative Analysis and various other revisions as
noted below and included in the Amendments to the Application that
follow as Part II of this Addendum.**

***Comment:*** In terms of international context, there is virtually no
discussion of the comparative merits of similar collections of great
houses and vacation communities in other countries, such as Bath and
Brighton in the United Kingdom, in continental Europe, Russia,
Argentina, and elsewhere. Absent such a discussion, there is no strong
rationale for why Gilded Age Newport is of exceptional international
influence or importance, as opposed to being very important nationally
in the United States.

***Response:*** **The Comparative Analysis has been revised and expanded
to include similar sites such as Bath, Brighton, Weimar, Paris and
Buenos Aires. What sets Newport apart from the others is the variety of
architectural styles and forms. Only Newport offers, in one compact
ensemble, an architectural variety that captures the spirit and practice
of Gilded Age design.**

***Comment:*** Regarding the significance attached to literary,
artistic, and other intellectual figures, there are serious questions
about the international, as opposed to national, recognition that has
been accorded to most of these individuals. The apparent lack of direct
connections of those individuals to the specific properties included in
this proposal is of concern. For example, the National Historic
Landmarks related to some of the figures prominently referenced are in
other communities and their Newport residences are not included or
identified in the Landmark documentation. Likewise, the many mentions of
properties not included in the Application are also really not germane
to its consideration for the World Heritage List.

***Response:* The application has been revised to center the literary
and artistic figures to the Griswold House (now known as the Newport Art
Museum) and the Newport Casino, where these figures gathered for
lectures, theater, musical performances and other cultural events.**

***Comment:*** In addition, there are certainly those, even in the U.S.,
who may doubt, if not be antagonized by, the repeated statements about
Newport's claimed preeminent role as a center of American intellectual
life, the assertion that it was central to the emergence of an "American
identity," and the claim that it was the center of an "American
Renaissance." Without substantiation through a critical consensus on
these points, they appear overstated and may harm, rather than help, the
case.

***Response:* The application has been revised to articulate Newport's
houses as a reflection of Gilded Age cultural forces rather than the
primary center of the American Renaissance.**

***Comment:*** There is an area of international significance that
should be the focus of additional work on this proposal. This is the
importance of "Gilded Age" Newport as an example of the international
diffusion of eclectic architectural and artistic design and building
techniques, primarily in this case their dispersal from Europe and
elsewhere to the Americas. This discussion needs to focus tightly on the
architects, craftsmen, and artists, many of them European or European
trained, and particularly on the clients, some of the latter of whom
were international figures and had international influence in ways
sometimes mentioned but not elaborated fully in this Application, but
all of whom participated in the construction and subsequent history of
these buildings. For example, in some cases, the European connections
extended to marriage into aristocratic families, especially British, and
thus it was ironically, in fact, in some cases American money that
restored European castles and other great houses as well as building
fresh ones in the U.S.

***Response:* The application has been amended to provide additional
information about the architects and their clients, along with more
fully elaborated descriptions of the international social and
architectural nexus of the Gilded Age. It has been further amended to
include references to and quotations from several leading publications
that featured houses in the Gilded Age ensemble, testifying to the
important place of Newport in the dissemination of architectural ideas
and forms.**

***Comment:*** Related issues that must be squarely confronted are the
perceptions that these properties are derivative from and less
distinguished than the European and other models from which they were at
least partially derived and that they were designed by architects who
are not internationally renowned. Placing "Gilded Age" Newport's
architecture, architects, builders, craftsmen, and owners in a well
prepared international comparative framework would be critically
helpful.

***Response:* The amendments address the quality of the architectural
work in Newport and its admiration by European , as well as American,
critics of the time. The amendments further examine the houses as
original works that drew upon historic sources but created something
wholly new.**

***Comment:*** Although the buildings included are collectively and
perhaps individually of exceptional national importance and Newport is
well known to be a major elite vacation community in the United States,
the comparative analysis does not make a good case as to why these
particular buildings are the best examples of domestic architecture
among surviving mansions and houses in the United States as a whole or
explain their relative historical relationships and merits relative to
those other surviving communities and great houses. Some of these were
associated with the same families as in Newport. The Vanderbilt Mansion
in New York and Biltmore in North Carolina are just two examples, and,
though of later date, San Simeon in California and Mar-a-Lago in Florida
ought at least to be mentioned.

***Response:* The application includes, in the Comparative Analysis, a
discussion of Newport's significance as a compact, high profile summer
resort with an architectural variety not seen in other communities. The
other houses in the United States exist primarily as isolated country
estates, which represent important singular examples of one
architectural style, but Newport represents the richness and diversity
of many 19^th^ and early 20^th^ century architectural styles together in
one locale whose fame, both nationally and internationally, served to
disseminate these landmarks to the world.**

***Comment:*** Finally, we understand that the Federal requirement for
securing the affirmative consent of all property owners may have played
a role in limiting the content of the proposal to what appears to be 11
buildings. (In that regard, there are two discrepancies between the map
and the list of sites that will need to be clarified.) Any other reasons
for their selection as a group (and the exclusion of others) would also
need to be made clear.

***Response:*** **The map has been amended to include the two properties
inadvertently left out of the initial version. The eleven buildings
selected for inclusion in the proposed Gilded Age ensemble were based on
the merits of those specific buildings as masterworks of their
architects and landmarks to their specific architectural style. .**

***Comment:*** It is hoped that a reformulation of this Application to
address the issues outlined above can be accomplished, because the
"Gilded Age" in America had a profound impact---albeit often not viewed
as beneficial even in the U.S.\--on the world, as well as the United
States.

***Response:* The Newport World Heritage Committee appreciates the
importance NPS places on the Gilded Age and would welcome the
opportunity to work together to prepare a compelling and successful
nomination.**

## Part II: Amendments to the Application

**2. DESCRIPTION AND HISTORY OF THE PROPERTY**

**2.a. Description of the Property**

# The Setting

***The first paragraph has been replaced by the following three
paragraphs. The rest of the section remains unchanged.***

During the Gilded Age, the period between 1840 and 1914, the leading
architects in the United States drew upon diverse world architectural
traditions in the creation of an enclave of houses and landscapes in the
summer resort of Newport, Rhode Island. These houses, representing a
variety of historic revival styles and innovative planning, made Newport
a critical laboratory of architectural experimentation. The Bellevue
Avenue and Ochre Point districts of Newport became the focal point for
the construction of houses as, by the 1860s, the city developed into the
premier summer resort in North America. As a center of fashionable
society and sport for the richest families in Gilded Age America,
Newport's summer residents and their houses were featured in both the
national and international press, which effectively served to
disseminate knowledge of these significant buildings throughout the
United States and abroad. The families who commissioned houses, and the
architects and artists engaged in their design, were prominent leaders
in an emerging international Gilded Age economic, social, political,
artistic, and cultural order. Throughout their business transactions,
travel and intermarriage with aristocratic European families, Newport's
families were connected to an international society. The Gilded Age was
a period of industrial growth, international business expansion,
exploration, and travel. The global outlook fostered by Gilded Age
culture was reflected in Newport's houses. Newport was a social,
artistic, and architectural enclave which served as a gathering place
where architects and patrons expressed their cultural ideas through a
specific group of houses. As a compact summer resort community with an
important presence in both the social and architectural press, Newport
was the stage for the presentation of America's evolving cultural
identity to the world.

The role of Newport as a world stage is clearly expressed in the
literature of the period. In 1904, Barr Feree wrote in *American Estates
and Gardens*, "A community of wealth and pleasure, Newport is the chief
city in the United States in which these characteristics are thoroughly
dominant...this great social activity needs and necessitates an
architectural background...The architectural thought which lay behind
the creation of Versailles is identical with the ideas that have brought
the great houses of Newport into existence. It is true that Versailles
was a single palace, while Newport is an aggregation of palaces...but
the palace of Versailles was a vast architectural background for court
fetes and festivities of all sorts. Just so, the palaces of Newport are
architectural backdrops for the pleasures and sports of its inhabitants.
The scale is different, the place and the manners, but the architectural
meaning of both is identical." The resort community of Newport was
clearly viewed during the Gilded Age as a place for the expression of
culture through architecture and social interaction. The buildings for
Newport's architectural backdrop drew upon a variety of European,
American, and Asian traditions. Newport's houses elicited interest and
comment from an international audience and was, thus, part of a
worldwide dialogue on the meaning of American culture and its use of
world traditions in the shaping of its architectural identity. This
dialogue is clearly evident in the work of the French novelist Paul
Bourget, a friend of Edith Wharton who visited America in 1893 and
published his account in *Outre Mer: Impressions of America* in 1895.
Bourget wrote of Newport " I am very sure that any one who has eyes to
see may discern the American spirit\--the real interest and the chief
reason of my journey\--behind the ostentation of Newport...here is a
bundle of sketches from life taken on the spur of the moment in response
to the first questions which one naturally asks in making a study of the
people of the world. How are they housed...? Detached villas, very near
the street...twenty, thirty, forty different styles of
construction...and so on along Bellevue Avenue...which, within a few
years, the caprice of millionaires has built upon the cliff...One of
these men has spent some time in England, and it has pleased him to
build for himself on one of these Rhode Island lawns, an English
abbey...Another man loves France, and he has seen fit to possess in
sight of the Atlantic a chateau in the style of the French
Renaissance...a third has built a marble palace precisely like the
Trianon with Corinthian pillars as large as those of the Temple of the
Sun at Baalbek. And these are not real imitation, pretentious and futile
attempts. No. In detail and finish they reveal conscientious study,
technical care. Evidently the best artist has been chosen and he has had
both freedom and money." Bourget evidently celebrates the American drive
to create a new and original architecture inspired by the past but not
derivative or in slavish imitation.

Newport's houses are American expressions and interpretations of world
architecture. The social, cultural, and architectural values of the
Gilded Age are preserved and embedded in the houses of Newport as they
are nowhere else in the world. Significant Gilded Age buildings were
created in the cities, towns, and country estates of the United States
and other countries, but Newport stands out as a small, concentrated
community of patrons and architects who created architectural landmarks
that survive today as a rare, intact ensemble of the period. Newport
reflects a moment, the Gilded Age, that expressed itself in built form,
specifically in the form of the detached domestic dwelling.

**The Ensemble**

***Revisions and/or additions are indicated in bold. The rest of the
section remains unchanged.***

The buildings in the ensemble each contribute to the outstanding value
of the Gilded Age Newport nomination. These buildings represent a
progression of ideas from innovative picturesque architecture of the
early and mid 19^th^ century to the formal and classical models of the
late 19^th^ and early 20^th^ centuries. They reflect the accomplishments
and artistic ideas promoted by their architects, which made Newport such
an important place in world culture in the late 19^th^ and early 20^th^
centuries. The houses listed in the nomination are outstanding
architectural works of great rarity and value; they also were gathering
places for many of the architects and artists who formed an important
cultural community which developed and debated the idea of an American
identity based on a fusion of world traditions. **The buildings selected
in the ensemble are the key character defining landmarks in the
district. They were not created in isolation. Their owners and
architects knew one another, moving in the same social circles,
patronizing the same cultural institutions, and visiting and studying
each other's houses.**

**Marble House (1892)** is a landmark to the influence of Beaux Arts
Classicism in the Gilded Age. A temple-like house inspired by the
Parthenon and the Petit Trianon, Marble House marked the beginnings of a
monumental architecture in the 1890s. Historic Revivalism was the
foundation of western architecture in the 19^th^ and early 20^th^
centuries and Marble House is one of its most opulent expressions. The
house reflects architect Richard Morris Hunt's training as the first
American to study architecture at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris and
his desire to bring an international and cosmopolitan aspect to American
architecture. The grounds include a Chinese Tea House (1914) based on
Sung Dynasty temples. Both Marble House and the Chinese Tea House
represent an important cultural shift away from picturesque architecture
to a formal, classical and monumental style based on the Italian
Renaissance and French classicism. Marble House and other Beaux Arts
inspired houses caused much cultural debate about the changing nature of
American society as reflected in its buildings. The writer Henry James
referred to these buildings as "white elephants" in *The American Scene*
(1907), viewing the houses as metaphors for America's loss of earlier
Republican values while embracing aristocratic European architectural
forms and social customs. **Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, the owner of
Marble House and an important patron in Richard Morris Hunt's
architectural career, expressed how world architectural traditions and
her own travels influenced the form of Marble House. In her unpublished
autobiography of 1917, on deposit in the Henry Huntington Library, Mrs.
Vanderbilt wrote of Marble House, "It was many years after the building
of this house (660 Fifth Avenue Vanderbilt residence in New York City)
that Mr. Hunt and I turned to what was destined to be the triumph of our
combined thought and of his workmanship. By this time, I had seen much
of the world and such treasures of Art and skill as had defined Time's
destruction from ancient Civilization till now. Egypt, Syria, Rome,
Greece, Europe in its various Renaissance illuminations had each made
their impression on my mind. From the world's greatest bouquets I had
now to choose my favorite bloom." Marble House is an exceptional Beaux
Arts house, a rare rendition of a French Classical building with facades
and main reception rooms in the Baroque of the Louis XIV period, and the
remainder of the building drawing upon historic periods and cultural
epochs referenced in Mrs. Vanderbilt's autobiography.**

**The Breakers (1895)** is a landmark to Gilded Age architecture and
culture. Modeled after an Italian Renaissance palazzo by architect
Richard Morris Hunt for railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt II, the
Breakers encapsulates the spirit of the Renaissance which informed the
cultural atmosphere of the Gilded Age. The Vanderbilts were
internationally renowned for their business empire and industrial
fortune. The family personified the millionaire culture of the Gilded
Age and their courtly style of life, and the monumental buildings that
were its setting and symbol were the archetype for a generation of
wealthy families. **The Breakers is not a copy of an Italian Renaissance
palace. It is an original and singular creation by Richard Morris Hunt,
who acquired Peter Paul Rubens "Palazzi di Genoa" (1622) and in a
studious and well informed fashion created a house with various Genoese
ornamental details and individual architectural features within an
original plan. The facades of The Breakers also display an approach to
massing and organization reflecting the influence of the renovations of
the Louvre Hunt worked on under the direction of Hector Lefuel in the
1850s. Thus, The Breakers is a testament to Hunt's creative adaptation
of historic European architecture to an American house.**

**Bellevue House (1910)** is a skillful interpretation of 18^th^ century
American, English, and French designs by Ogden Codman, Jr., a major
force in shaping architectural taste away from Victorian eclecticism
toward a formal classicism. He collaborated with Edith Wharton on *The
Decoration of Houses* (1897), which became a canonical work of classical
design and worldwide bestseller. Codman's buildings in Newport and his
publication with Edith Wharton represent the type of artistic and
cultural collaboration that was fostered by the cultural colony of
Gilded Age Newport. **Bellevue House is a masterpiece by Codman, and
reflects the design philosophies which he and Edith Wharton popularized
in *The Decoration of Houses*. Architectural details and planning
methods adapted from 18^th^ century sources and a subjugation of all
ornament to the architectural form in Bellevue House are direct
expression of the design philosophy expressed in *The Decoration of
Houses*. The house is an original work in the Classical Revival manner
combining an 18^th^ century American inspired facade, a central stair
hall in the form of an English Neo-Classical rotunda, and an
interlocking system of small hallways and transitional spaces adapted
from 18^th^ century French townhouse plans.**

**2.b. History and Development of the Property**

**The Gilded Age**

***The first two paragraphs of this section have been deleted.***

**The Summer Cultural Community of Newport during the Gilded Age**

***This section has been substantially shortened as follows. Revisions
and/or additions are indicated in bold.***

**Newport attracted a summer community of internationally renowned
artists, writers, architects, academics and philosophers who formed an
important cultural enclave. This group met socially but also more
formally in clubs, such as the Town and Country Club, which purchased
the Griswold House in 1912, and the Newport Casino, the site of literary
readings, lectures and plays. The summer cultural community provided for
the exchange of ideas, which architects expressed in the landmark
buildings comprising the Gilded Age ensemble.**

**The Griswold House became an important center for Newport's cultural
and artistic community.** The most central figure among the New England
intellectuals who spent summers in Newport was the poet, critic and
social activist **Julia Ward Howe** (1819-1910). Best known today as the
author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," Julia Ward Howe was a
prolific writer and lecturer, the editor of the abolitionist newspaper
*The Commonwealth*, and eventually President of the National American
Woman Suffrage Association. Her essays reached an international audience
and her influence was profound. Her husband, **Samuel Gridley Howe**
(1801-1876) was, with Lord Byron, one of the heroes of the battle for
Greek independence, also a major American abolitionist, and the founder
of the highly innovative Perkins Institute for the Blind.

Mrs. Howe, with her reform background and passionately progressive
sentiments, was one of the writers in Newport's ongoing cultural
dialogue who criticized the growing materialism of 19^th^ century
America. A partisan of true democracy, she argued in her voluminous
correspondence and in such essays as "Is Polite Society Polite?" (1881)
for a social order based upon merit rather than birth or wealth and for
public policies that fostered an inclusive republic. By force of
personality, Mrs. Howe brought together the talented people of an entire
era. By the early 1870s, the seasonal intellectual community of Newport
had become so rich with the renowned and gifted that Howe organized the
group into a summer cultural club, the Town and Country Club
(1871-1905), through which these luminaries amused and socialized with
one another for more than thirty years. In 1912 the heirs to this
legendary club reorganized Newport's cultural community into the Newport
Art Association (now the Newport Art Museum and Association), making it
the oldest surviving public art association in the nation. **The Art
Association purchased the Griswold House (1862), the Stick Style
masterpiece by one of the original members of the Town and Country Club,
Richard Morris Hunt. The Griswold House became a center for artistic
life and cultural exchange in Newport.**

As the era closed, the ranks of wealthy Newport families so interested
in patronage produced one significant artist, **Gertrude Vanderbilt
Whitney** (1875-1942). Although late in the era, Whitney is very much a
product of the Gilded Age, both in her chosen themes and in her
passionate commitment to establishing respect for identifiably American
art. **The daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, who built The
Breakers (1895) in Newport, Gertrude Vanderbilt married Harry Payne
Whitney in 1896 and summered in Newport until her death in 1942. Mrs.
Whitney was a primary supporter of the Newport Art Association, which
was based in the Griswold House (1862).** Beginning in 1900, Whitney
pursued a career as a talented sculptor who received major commissions
for monumental statues in heroic poses. She emerged as an essential
patron of American artists, helping to found the Colony Club for women
artists in 1903, organizing the legendary Armory Show of 1913, and
establishing the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1930.

**The Newport Casino played host to major literary figures and also
appeared as an important setting in literary works.** Newport was so
universally recognized as a major cultural center during the Gilded Age
that legendary figures, such as **Oscar Wilde**, the great British
playwright, author and gadfly, visited the city as a guest of Mrs. Howe
to give public **lectures. On July 15, 1883, Oscar Wilde presented a
lecture entitled "The Beautiful" at the Newport Casino. Wilde was on a
literary tour of the United States as an emissary of the English
Aesthetic Movement, of which he was a primary arbiter.**

**The Newport Casino, and the nearby Isaac Bell House, also featured
prominently in the architectural criticism of the period. Marianna
Griswold van Rensselaer (1851-1934), a Newport summer resident, friend
of architect Stanford White, and one of the first women established in
architectural criticism, was noted for her writings on architecture,
landscape design, and decorative art. Her work appeared in such
prominent journals as *Century Magazine* and *American Architect and
Building News*.**

As the Gilded Age era was eclipsed by World War I, one last young
intellectual made his way to Newport for a year's residence that would
convince him of his vocation as a writer. **Thornton Wilder**, who would
become one of the most important 20^th^ century American playwrights and
writers, three times winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and the first
recipient of the National Medal for Literature, sojourned in Newport in
1917-18. It took him until 1973 to assimilate that experience and write
about it in *Theophilus North*, his last book. Looking back to that era,
Wilder adapted a quintessentially Renaissance metaphor to his formative
American experience, as the nine circles of Dante's *Inferno* became the
shaping image of the writer's final novel**, which was organized into
the nine cities of Newport. The Newport Casino appears as the primary
location of the novel, the place where the main character, Theophilus
North, taught tennis and met the social characters that would slowly
unveil the stories of the nine cities of Newport. The Casino was the
architectural entry point to fashionable Bellevue Avenue, the main
thoroughfare in the Gilded Age ensemble, and the social gathering point
of the community.**

# Newport's Architectural Circle

***Additions and/or revisions are indicated in bold. The rest of the
section remains unchanged.***

**Charles Follen McKim** (1847-1909) was a summer resident through the
1870s and was deeply influenced by living in "The Point" neighborhood
along the harbor, with its hundreds of surviving original colonial
houses. Intrigued by the details of colonial American architecture,
McKim remodeled the old Robinson and Dennis houses on Washington Street
between 1872-1876. **McKim commissioned an early series of photographs
of colonial Newport architecture, and these sources influenced his work
on the Newport Casino and the Isaac Bell house with partner Stanford
White. Colonial American details, fused with classical Renaissance
planning, became a hallmark of McKim's work, reflecting his combination
of American architectural traditions with European precedents. McKim was
the third American to attend the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris. He was
preceded by Richard Morris Hunt and Henry Hobson Richardson. McKim's
European training endowed him with a sense of classical planning and an
erudite command of western ornament and design. McKim's belief that
understanding the heritage of the western world as a foundation for
architectural education led him to serve as a key founder of the
American Academy in Rome.**

**Stanford White** (1853-1906) also became a summer resident in the
middle 1870s, as he studied painting with John LaFarge. Together, McKim
and White embarked on a study of American colonial architecture of the
New England seacoast. Many of their sketches record farmhouses, barns,
and town dwellings in Newport and the surrounding area. They
photographed the George Berkeley house, Whitehall, in Middletown. These
shingled walls, gables, porches, and colonial decorative details were
imaginatively combined with other architectural sources from Europe and
Asia as, in the 1880s, McKim, Mead & White created masterful American
buildings in the Shingle Style such as the **Newport Casino** (1880) and
the **Isaac Bell House** (1883).

**Richard Morris Hunt** (1827-1895) was a longtime seasonal resident
with deep Newport associations **and an international reputation.** Hunt
maintained a house and studio in Newport, was responsible for numerous
local commissions, and is buried in Newport. He and his wife were
members of the Town and Country Club. Often called "the Dean of American
Architecture," Hunt was the first American to attend the Ecole des Beaux
Arts in Paris and was the founder of the classical academic, or Beaux
Arts, movement in American architecture. He married the best traditions
of western European architecture to American forms and materials. His
work in Newport ranges from the Stick Style of the **Griswold House**
(1862), through European style cottages like the Hypoteneuse House,
through creative renovations like **Chateau-sur-Mer** to Beaux Arts
palaces in the grand manner like **Marble House** (1888-1892) and **The
Breakers** (1895). **Hunt was honored by the Royal Institute of British
Architects.**

The built environment of 19^th^ century Newport reflects the cultural
ferment of the Gilded Age that energized the summer resort community.
**The domestic designs of the architects working in Gilded Age Newport
were disseminated through contemporary books and** **periodicals and in
their own writings, reflecting Newport's crucial role as a showcase of
architectural design to a national and international audience**. Just as
Henry James's novels weigh American innocence and potential ignorance
against European culture and potential decadence in an effort to find
the correct balance for American civilization, so do the houses in the
nominated ensemble seek the perfect balance of American functionality
with the elegance of world traditions. Nowhere in the United States is
there such an intact, beautifully preserved, publicly accessible
ensemble that demonstrates the conscious search for an American identity
through bricks and mortar.

**3. JUSTIFICATION FOR INSCRIPTION IN THE WORLD HERITAGE LIST**

**3.c. Comparison of proposed property to similar or related properties
(including state of preservation of similar properties)**

***This section has been substantially expanded as follows. The
additions are indicated in bold.***

There are currently no sites on the World Heritage List that relate
directly to the Gilded Age and the domestic architectural ensemble of
the period. There are no urban areas or urban and/or resort ensembles of
buildings in the United States that have been inscribed as World
Heritage sites.

The Gilded Age Newport serial nomination provides an opportunity to
inscribe on the World Heritage List an ensemble of buildings that
encapsulate the cultural forces of 19^th^ and early 20^th^ century
industrialized western society. The buildings in the Gilded Age Newport
ensemble are a testament to the use of diverse world traditions in the
creation of a cultural identity. Newport was a resort town that played
host to a large gathering of cultural leaders, from architects and
writers to artists and painters. The legacy of this cultural firmament
is the ensemble of Newport buildings that are the key features of the
serial nomination.

Two urban ensembles on the World Heritage List compare in some aspects
to Newport:

**The City of Bath, England,** was a resort of note in late 18^th^ and
early 19^th^ century Britain, figuring prominently in the popular
imagination and in literature.

**Classical Weimar, Germany,** was a seat of the Enlightenment and a
cradle of the genius of writers such as Goethe.

Bath is noted for its comprehensive and classically inspired 18^th^
century urban plan, while Newport encapsulates a picturesque and
suburban-oriented resort plan of the 19^th^ century. Newport, like Bath,
has a powerful cultural meaning as a fashionable resort where the rich,
powerful and culturally influential gathered and exchanged ideas.

Weimar, the seat of a ducal court, was a governmental center and a place
of enlightened scholarship. The intact urban setting of Weimar is a
built testament to the cultural ideas of the Age of Enlightenment.
Newport has a powerful place in history as a preserved, intact ensemble
of buildings that reflect the cultural ideas of its own time: the Gilded
Age.

Newport shares with Bath and Weimar the distinction of being a preserved
architectural ensemble that reflects the cultural firmament of a given
period in history. Newport is singular and unique in its specific layout
and architectural character. Newport is a seaside resort town that
includes both picturesque cottages and formal, classically inspired
palatial villas set among landscaped grounds with spectacular views of
the sea. The layout of Newport is thus far more dispersed than the more
compact and urban ensembles of Bath and Weimar.

**Brighton also serves as an example of a fashionable resort. Developed
in the late 18^th^ and early 19^th^ centuries, and made eminently
fashionable by the Prince Regent, later King George IV, Brighton is
famed for the singular work of architecture known as the Royal Pavilion
(1815-21), as remodeled by architect John Nash. Drawing upon Indian and
Chinese architectural sources, the Royal Pavilion displays the tendency
toward fantasy and romanticism that characterized 19^th^ century resort
architecture. Apart from the Royal Pavilion, the remainder of Brighton
reflects the orderly development of classically inspired terraced houses
that developed in Bath in the late 18^th^ century. While Brighton is an
important example of resort planning, it does not have the breadth and
variety of detached house forms so prominently featured in Newport.**

**There are also other urban ensembles which compare to Gilded Age
Newport, such as Buenos Aires, Argentina. In the period between 1880 and
1920, Buenos Aires adopted a Beaux Arts classicism similar to that of
other great cities, such as Paris and New York. Architects and interior
designers of international repute, such as the Paris based architect,
Rene Sergent and the decorating house of the Carlihan Brothers, created
buildings such as the Bosch Palace (1912-1917), a Classical Revival
house inspired by 18^th^ century French design. The building is similar
to its contemporaries in Newport, such as The Breakers, Marble House and
The Elms. The Hotel Jacquemart Andre (1875) and the Hotel Camondo (1913)
in Paris also display a Classical Revival manner of design similar to
that of Newport and Buenos Aires. All of these buildings embrace the
Classical** **Revival style and rational planning methodology advocated
by the Ecole des Beaux Arts. These buildings are also in neighborhoods
with broad tree lined avenues so typical of fashionable Gilded Age
residential districts.**

**These houses were created by the financial and industrial elite of the
Gilded Age, who were part of an international economic and social order,
drawing upon classical European sources to create an identity linked to
the grand traditions of an aristocratic and court culture. The
international importance of Newport's families was reinforced by
marriage alliances, business connections and diplomatic assignments. For
example, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, Consuelo,
was engaged to the 9^th^ Duke of Marlborough at Marble House in Newport.
The most celebrated wedding** **of the Gilded Age, the
Vanderbilt-Marlborough marriage was one of many alliances between
American millionaires and British and European aristocratic families.
The result of these marriages was the creation of an important
international society connected through family bloodlines. Vanderbilt
millions restored the Marlborough ancestral country estate, Blenheim
Palace.**

**The building of opulent Classical Revival style houses in Newport,
such as The Breakers and Marble House, during the 1890s coincided with
the United States' emergence in that decade as the most powerful
industrial nation in the world. The richest families in the newly
established richest nation were building Newport houses as a stage upon
which to receive the world. The aristocracy of the old European order,
in a long historical tradition, was seeking marriage alliances with the
most powerful new nation. Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, who built
The Breakers, married their daughter, Gladys, to the Hungarian Count
Laszlo Szechenyi in 1908. Count Szechenyi served as Hungarian minister
to the United States from 1935 to 1937 and used The Breakers as a summer
consulate. Isaac Bell of Newport was appointed U.S. Minister to the
Netherlands in 1887. These marriages and diplomatic positions serve as
examples Newport's connection to an international world.**

**American resorts and country houses also offer opportunities for
comparative analysis with Newport. Bar Harbor, Maine, Easthampton and
Southampton, New York, Stockbridge and Lenox, Massachusetts, and Palm
Beach, Florida are examples of 19^th^ century fashionable resort
communities. The Maine, Massachusetts, and New York resorts offer a
variety of architectural styles created by well know architects, many of
whom also worked in Newport. Palm Beach was also frequented by the same
fashionable families who spent summers in Newport, although Palm Beach
has a more uniform architectural character limited primarily to a
revival of Spanish colonial design traditions. In each case, none of
these resort communities held Newport's place as the "Queen of Resorts".
Newport established the architectural fashions. The Italianate villa
(1845) for Edward King in Newport was featured in the best selling
*Architecture of Country Houses* (1852), Chateau sur Mer (1852) was
photographed for *Artistic Houses* (1885) and the Isaac Bell House
(1883) was featured in *Artistic Country Seats* (1886). In** ***American
Estates and Gardens* (1904) Newport is the first chapter in a book
devoted to the design of American houses. Newport and its houses appear
first as the standard for the remainder of the design world in Gilded
Age publications. Newport's place as a showcase of American architecture
and its role as a primary disseminator of design through publications is
clearly evident in the critique by Marianna Griswold van Rensselaer, a
renowned architectural critic and Newport summer resident, in her work
"American Country Dwellings" featured in *The Century Magazine* (May
1886). Mrs. Van Rensselaer wrote: "But to the student of domestic
architecture, Newport is the most interesting of our summer colonies.
Its history is the longest...Colonial houses are abundant...Its newer
portions show a characteristic instance of that way of village planning,
which I have already spoken of as peculiarly American - wide streets of
detached houses, each with its own small lawn and garden, and all
overshadowed by thickset and lofty trees. Here the architecture includes
every post-colonial type: the plain, square piazzaed box; the
'vernacular' villa with 'French roof' and jig-saw fringing and abnormal
hues of paint; the pseudo 'Queen Anne' cottage; and that still later
product (shingle style buildings) which is again thoroughly American,
but in a new and better way." Mrs. Van Rensselaer was writing about
Newport's architectural variety and its significance to America's
architectural education.**

**There are several American houses and country estates which are
contemporary with Newport's Gilded Age houses. These estates embody the
architectural ideals and historic revivalism of the 19^th^ and early
20^th^ centuries.**

**Lyndhurst (1838), by Alexander Jackson Davis, is a masterwork of the
Gothic Revival style set on a hillside overlooking the Hudson River in
Tarrytown, New York. While Lyndhurst is a grand country estate in stone,
Newport's Kingscote (1841) is a smaller, picturesque villa set in a
small two acre landscape garden. Both buildings are by masters of the
Gothic Revival. Lyndhurst was a model for the grand country estate,
which was rarely realized in Gothic Revival form. Kingscote is a villa,
its small scale making it a model for many Gothic Revival ornamental
cottages that appeared throughout the emerging suburbs of the United
States.**

**The Morse Libby House (1859-63), by Henry Austin, in Portland, Maine
is a superb example of an Italianate house. However, the Edward King
House (1845) in Newport was the building selected to represent the ideal
Italianate villa in Andrew Jackson Downing's internationally acclaimed
"The Architecture of Country Houses" (1852). Thus, the Edward King House
was used as the example to disseminate the Italianate manner throughout
the United States.**

**Naumkeag (1886), by architects McKim, Mead and White, in Stockbridge,
Massachusetts is a fine expression of the Shingle Style by the
architects who were leading contributors to its refinement and
articulation. The house is a superb work of architecture, yet, again,
the The Newport Casino (1881) and the Isaac Bell House (1883) in Newport
were selected for publication in George Sheldon's *Artistic Country
Seats* (1886). Sheldon recognized the Bell House as a masterpiece of the
style, referring to it as an example of the "modernized colonial", a
singularly individual and original architectural work drawing upon
historic traditions. The Bell House is the building where Sheldon gave
the style its name, clearly demonstrating Newport's place as a trend
setting, style setter for American architecture. Sheldon also wrote of
the Newport Casino as follows: "As a source of aesthetic pleasure, the
country clubhouse in the United States is scarcely more than eight years
old." Its beginning may be traced to the Newport Casino, designed by
Messrs. McKim, Mead and White. Again, Newport, and the Newport Casino
specifically, was acknowledged as a cradle for architectural talent and
the introduction of new architectural forms and styles to the nation.
The innovative quality of Shingle Style architecture in Newport was
singled out by Vincent J. Scully in *The Shingle Style and the Stick
Style* (1955), when he wrote: "One phase in American domestic
architecture...the wooden, suburban building of the period 1872 to about
1889...developed...into a unique American achievement in architecture,
one which has since been acclaimed by the whole world...One approaches,
in these years and in this program, a critical moment during which the
past bore fruit and from which much later growth evolved. The
philosophical and formal basis for Frank Lloyd Wright's work, for
example, was in large measure laid down during this period, as were also
the bases for the colonial revival and 20^th^ century eclecticism."
Newport's houses, the Griswold House (1862), the Newport Casino (1881)
and the Isaac Bell House (1883) were central landmarks in this
innovative articulation of the wooden detached house and featured
prominently in the press to disseminate these creative architectural
ideas.**

**Biltmore (1895), by Richard Morris Hunt in Asheville, North Carolina,
and Hyde Park (1896-1898) by McKim, Mead and White in Hyde Park, New
York, are two grand Beaux Arts country estates for the Vanderbilt
family. Biltmore was built in the French Renaissance manner for George
Washington Vanderbilt, while Hyde Park is a Classical Revival style
house for his brother Frederick William Vanderbilt. Their other two
brothers, Cornelius and William Kissam Vanderbilt, built The Breakers
and Marble House in Newport. All of these Vanderbilt houses are tour de
force landmark of Gilded Age historic revivalism on the most opulent
scale. The Vanderbilts' Newport houses are distinguished from the
family's country estates due to the high profile aspect of Newport as a
seaside resort. The Vanderbilts' Newport houses were featured far more
often in periodicals, such as *Architectural Record*, than their country
estates.**

**The Mount (1902), Edith Wharton's country estate in Lenox,
Massachusetts, is a superb example of the Classical Revival design
philosophy articulated in *The Decoration of Houses* (1897) by Edith
Wharton and Ogden Codman. The Mount is a grand country estate set on a
vast acreage. Codman initiated the design with Wharton, but the final
execution of the project was completed by the architect Francis Hoppin.
Codman's Bellevue House (1910) in Newport is another excellent example
of the design philosophy expressed in *The Decoration of Houses*.
Bellevue House is the most completely realized of Codman's designs for a
summer house. It's location in Newport, the high** **profile location of
a summer resort community, set in a two acre garden, sets it apart from
the isolated and grand country estate that is The Mount. Again, the
importance of Bellevue House lies in the fact that it is a masterpiece
of architectural design set within an enclave of buildings, not a house
in isolation.**

**Two 20^th^ century estates also reflect the continued interest in
historic revivalism that marked earlier Gilded Age buildings: Mar a Lago
in Palm Beach, Florida, and Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California.**

**Mar a Lago (1924-27) was designed by architect Joseph Urban for
Marjorie Merriweather Post in Palm Beach. The Oceanside estate is in a
Spanish Colonial Revival style, which predominated in Palm Beach. The
house is a fine example of the historicism that prevailed through the
early 20^th^ century. Mar a Lago is a significant character defining
landmark of Palm Beach.**

**San Simeon (1919-1947) was designed by architect Julia Morgan for
William Randolph Hearst. The hilltop house dominates the surrounding
California countryside as the center of an expansive estate. The
building reflects the influence of Spanish Colonial architecture and
includes exterior details and interior architectural fragments acquired
throughout Europe and the Middle East. The eclectic variety of historic
detail again reflects the strong and continued interest in historic
revivalism, inspired by a variety of cultural sources, which first began
during the Gilded Age.**

**Both Mar a Lago and Hearst Castle were built for individuals who
reaped their wealth from American industry and commerce. Mar a Lago is
part of a resort community, similar to the houses of Newport, while
Hearst Castle is an isolated country estate, much like Biltmore House in
Asheville, North Carolina. Again, what sets Newport apart from these
single houses and estates is its variety of architecture and number of
landmark houses in close proximity to one another that form an important
enclave of buildings which strongly express the richness, breadth and
spirit of the Gilded Age.**

**Newport's significance derives from that fact that its landmark
buildings do not stand alone, but exist in an ensemble that is a clear
reflection of the cultural forces at work during the Gilded Age.**

**What sets Newport apart from Bath, Brighton, Weimar, Paris, and Buenos
Aires is the variety of architectural styles and building forms.
Newport's Gilded Age district encompasses the picturesque asymmetrical
Gothic Revival and Italianate villas of the first half of the 19^th^
century, the arts and crafts inspired Stick, Queen Anne Revival and
Shingle styles of the 1870s and 1880s with their eclectic design sources
from western and eastern cultural sources and innovative open floor
plans, and the Beaux Arts influenced Classical Revival houses of the
1890s through 1914, which reassert a formal, classical hierarchy in
design, planning, and ornamentation. Bath is a unified and harmonious**
**expression of 18^th^ century classicism within a picturesque
landscape; Brighton combined the individuality of the Royal Pavilion
with the classical terraced houses characterizing the remainder of the
town; Weimar is a classical ensemble of Enlightenment concepts; Paris
and Buenos Aires, large and more urban than Newport and these
aforementioned resort towns, have an architectural unity based on Beaux
Arts classicism. Only Newport offers, in one compact ensemble, an
architectural variety that captures the spirit and practice of Gilded
Age design. Historic revivalism in all of its guises, from the early
19^th^ century picturesque to late 19^th^ century Beaux Arts classicism,
is presented in one district. Newport's houses reflect the tendency of
the Gilded Age to draw upon world cultures in the creation of
architectural forms and the evolution of these forms through the 19^th^
and early 20^th^ centuries. Just as Bath encapsulates the classicism and
picturesque principles of the 18^th^ century, Newport embodies the
historic revivalism and fascination for world cultural traditions that
characterized the Gilded Age. The breadth and variety of the houses in
the Gilded Age Newport ensemble make it the singular and most richly
representative place in the world for the culture of the Gilded Age and
its expression through the detached house form.**