Glass House

Philip Johnson Glass House
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Glass House
Location:	798-856 Ponus Ridge Road, New Canaan, Connecticut
Coordinates:	41°8′32.73″N 73°31′45.84″W / 41.142425°N 73.5294°W / 41.142425; -73.5294
Built/Founded:	1949
Architect:	Philip Cortelyou Johnson
Architectural style(s):	Modern Movement
Governing body:	National Trust for Historic Preservation
Added to NRHP:	February 18, 1997[1]
Designated NHL:	February 18, 1997[2]
NRHP Reference#:	97000341

The Glass House or Johnson house, built in 1949 in New Canaan, Connecticut, was designed by Philip Johnson as his own residence and is a masterpiece in the use of glass. It was an important and influential project for Johnson and his associate Richard Foster, and for modern architecture. The building is an essay in minimal structure, geometry, proportion, and the effects of transparency and reflection. The estate includes other buildings designed by Johnson that span his career.

House and property

The house is mostly hidden from the public view. It is located behind a stone wall at the edge of a crest in Johnson’s estate overlooking a pond. The exterior sides of the Glass House are charcoal-painted steel and glass. The brick floor is about 10 inches above the ground. The interior is open with the space divided by low walnut cabinets; a brick cylinder contains the bathroom and is the only object to reach floor to ceiling. The house builds on ideas of German architects from the 1920s ("Glasarchitektur"). In a house of glass, the views of the landscape are its “wallpaper”. The house is often compared to Mies van der Rohe's Farnsworth House.

Other structures

Guest House

Entrance to the Painting Gallery

Johnson's rambling 47-acre (190,000 m²) estate also includes eight other structures that Johnson built including the guest house (1949-1950), the pavilion (1962), painting gallery (1965), sculpture gallery (1970), the study (1980), the ghost house (1982), the Kirstein Tower (1985) (named for Johnson's friend Lincoln Kirstein) and the gate house ("Da Monsta", 1995). The painting gallery is built underground with an entrance modeled on Agamemnon's Tomb. The paintings are displayed on a system of three revolving racks of carpeted panels.^[3] The ghost house was built with chain-link fencing on the foundation of an old barn and has lilies planted inside.^[4]

Three other existing vernacular houses on the estate (Popestead, Grainger, and Calluna Farms) were remodeled by Johnson.^[5]

Status

It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1997.^[2][6] The house was the place of Philip Johnson's passing on January 25, 2005 at the age of 98. After Johnson's death ownership of the Glass House passed to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which opened it to visitors in April 2007.

Documentary

In the 1997 documentary, Philip Johnson: Diary of an Eccentric Architect,^[7] Johnson discusses the buildings he built on the property (his "diary") with a focus on his latest, Da Monsta.

Gallery

Visitor center in downtown New Canaan

The Glass House Visitors Center glass door

A model of the Glass House on display at MOMA in NYC

References

External links

• Official site
• Splendor in the Glass, TIME Magazine

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