"I dream't I dwelt in marble halls"
Devoted to the histories and current state of the great mansions of America's Gilded Age.

Monday, June 14, 2010

"Ballrooms of the Gilded Age"



The Ballroom of the William C. Whitney mansion as renovated by Stanford White around 1900. The house was located at Fifth Avenue & 68th Street and was the primary home of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and remained in the family until her death in the 1942. The house was torn down shortly after.
This was the home that " Little Gloria" had to spend her time with her Aunt after the famous custody case against her mother, Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt.


"The Mrs. Astor's" famous ballroom, where you were nobody in New York Society if you were not invited to attend one of her fabulous balls. The story goes that young ladies of society would wait all evening for an invitation to sit next to Mrs. Astor on her divan and if no invitation was extended, the evening was ruined and tears would be shed. This is the ballroom which reputably held only 400 of the very best people in Society. Located in her Richard Morris Hunt Chateau at 65th Street and Fifth Avenue. When the house was torn down in 1926, to be replaced by the Temple Emanuel, one of the World's largest synagogues, John Ringling of the famous " Ringling Brother's Circus" bought many of the furnishings for his new estate he was building in Sarasorta, Florida called, "Ca d' Zan" , where they still reside today.

Click HERE to see the Grand Staircase of the Astor Mansion.

Click HERE to see the exterior and floor plans of the Astor Mansion.

5 comments:

Karena said...

I still cannot believe these fabulous historical properties were torn down!

Karena
Art by Karena

The Down East Dilettante said...

Funny thing, just half an hour before I saw this, a friend who is reading the biography of Emily Post and I were talking about the 400 and Mrs. Astor's ballroom, and here it is!

Gary Lawrance said...

It's also amazing that for such an important space in it's time, there aren't a lot of photos of it. Of course in those days, the media was not invited into a private home and
according to one of the Astor biographies, Mrs. Astor was camera shy.

Kevin Durst said...

Thank you for all the great posts in 2011 and look forward to all the new ones in 2012. Happy New Year!

Unknown said...

Does anyone have a floor plan of the Astor's Rokeby mansion

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