maandag 25 juni 2012

Orchard House, the house is most noted for being where Louisa May Alcott wrote and set her beloved classic, Little Women, in 1868.




PARLOR: This formal room is decorated with period wallpaper and a patterned reproduction carpet. Arched niches were built by Mr. Alcott to display busts of his favorite philosophers, Socrates and Plato. Family portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Alcott and watercolors by May Alcott adorn the walls. On May 23, 1860, 
Anna Alcott, the model for Meg March, was married to John Bridge Pratt beneath an arbor in this room.



DINING ROOM: Family conversations about abolitionism, women's suffrage and social reform were often held around the dining room table. The Alcotts were vegetarians and harvested fruits and vegetables from the gardens and orchards found on the twelve acres of property. Family china, portraits of Elizabeth and Louisa, and paintings by May are displayed along with period furnishings. The Alcotts performed theatricals using the dining room as their stage while guests watched from the adjoining parlor.


LOUISA'S CHAMBER: A room of her own had always been a priority for Louisa. With her often turbulent emotions, her vivid, romantic imagination, and her constant preoccupation with her family's welfare, she needed a haven in which to escape, where she could find solitude and where she could write. Louisa's father built her a half-moon desk between two windows and a bookcase to hold her favorite books. May painted a panel of Calla lilies beside the desk and an owl on the fireplace.



KITCHEN: "All of the philosophy in our house is not in the study, a good deal is in the kitchen, where a fine old lady thinks high thoughts and does good deeds while she cooks and scrubs." (LMA Journal December, 1860). Mrs. Alcott, Louisa, Anna and May prepared and preserved food, and washed and ironed laundry in this room. Original features include the soapstone sink given to Mrs. Alcott by Louisa, a hot water reservoir, and a drying rack designed by Mr. Alcott for laundry. Mrs. Alcott's bread board, mortar and pestle, tin spice chest and wooden bowls are displayed on the Hutch table and countertops.


STUDY: "If in Emerson's study perpetual twilight reigns," wrote a visitor to Orchard House in 1874," in Alcott's it is always noon. The great sun shines in it all day, the great fireplace roars, and the warm crimson hangings temper the sunlight and reflect the firelight. Quaint mottoes and pictures hang on the walls." Mr. Alcott's books fill the shelves and the room is furnished with his library table, chair and desk. The Concord School of Philosophy, an adult, co-educational summer school led by Mr. Alcott, first met in this room until a larger building adjacent to Orchard House was constructed in 1880.


dinsdag 19 juni 2012

Arenenburg. House of Hortense de Beauharnais

In Arenenberg Hortense had at last found a permanent home, and there she passed the greater part of the year; and it was only when the autumnal storms began to howl through her open and lightly-constructed villa, that Hortense repaired to Rome, to pass the winter months in a more genial climate, while her son Louis Napoleon was pursuing his studies at the artillery school at Thun. Gutenberg CHAPTER_I.4

Salon at Arenenburg





Bed of Hortense de Beauharnais

dinsdag 12 juni 2012

Virginia Woolf's Monk’s House.

Virginia Woolf's bedroom. The pale green was a favourite colour.
nttreasurehunt
Virginia and Leonard bought Monk’s House in 1919 for £700. It was ‘an unpretending house’ as Virginia called it, and she liked it that way.

Sitting room
                                                                    The writing lodge

dinsdag 5 juni 2012

Drover's Run, Megs Cottage


Megs cottage



                                                                
 Kitchen Megs cottage


modthesims

Taverne Charley.

 O p Boulevard Garibaldi nr. 20 stond de Taverne Charley, die in 1933 werd geopend en nu is verdwenen. Simone de Beauvoir vestigde zich er g...