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Lake Mahopac, New York
I’ve been thinking babe maybe you’re right when you said the pain weathers in time
In Westchester County, New York, on Lake Mahopac, or, more specifically on an island in the middle of Lake Mahopac, is Petra Island, an interesting project that’s kind of a Frank Lloyd Wright project while also being kind of not a Frank Lloyd Wright project at the same time.
There are two buildings at Petra Island, and we’re starting with an original Frank Lloyd Wright designed guesthouse, the first building on the site. We’ll get to the other building next.
Back in the 1950s, the original owner of the island hired Wright to design a house, but due to cost, only the guest house was built during Wright’s lifetime. The island changed hands and the new owners continued with the rest of the project (we’ll get to that next), and now offer private tours of the complex as (according to the internet) they’re looking to sell it. The tours are not cheap, but they are pretty exclusive. They start with a five minute boat ride out to the island, are led by the actual very friendly owners, and come with lots of interesting stories as you have (just about) full access to their actual home. Regardless of what I’m going to say next, it was a great experience and highly recommended.
There are two buildings at Petra Island, that original Frank Lloyd Wright guesthouse and the more recently completed main residence. While both buildings are quite nice and well positioned on a spectacular site, you can really tell which one was designed by Wright and which one was inspired by him. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation was not involved with the new building, and when you’re there it’s hard not to imagine how much better the building and detailing would have been if they were.
The owner and the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation fought in court, and the owner ended up winning, which is kind of a real shame. When you’re here you understand the difference and why the foundation fought so hard against it- without their involvement, bad design and finish decisions were made during construction that if the ghost of Frank Lloyd Wright ever found out about would certainly result in one hell of a haunting. As an example, just check out the first picture and look at the way the linear LED light was added and just cut right through that wood soffit, even as those other nearby triangles were there specifically for light fixtures. There is no way that the foundation would have allowed something like that. And while the main concept and some of the spaces are quite lovely, things like that light really just prove how much different the real Wright house (or the foundation approved house) would have been.
Next up we’re getting even more local with a tour sponsored by my local AIA section, the Architects League of Northern New Jersey. The tour focused on houses designed by Carl Kemm Loven in Ridgewood and Glen Rock, two old school suburban towns in Bergen County. The houses look kind of Disney castle-ish, and according to the tour, Loven was actually friends with Walt and may have even collaborated on some early Disney work, which certainly seems like a plausible story.
We’re getting even more local and going to Mendham, New Jersey for this year’s Mansion in May event, a local fundraiser by the Women’s Association for the Morristown Medical Center that takes a large house (a mansion, if you will), invites interior designers to go nuts in each room, then opens it to the public for every day in May. This generally happens every other (or sometimes every other other) year, and this is the fifth or sixth consecutive mansion I visited. Always a great experience.
I met one of my good friends in Connecticut and we decided to stop by Grace Farms which remains beautiful despite not being completely aware of who owns it or why it was built. It’s probably one of those places best enjoyed at Dave value without getting in too deep and overthinking things too much.
When we visited, we were in the tea room when some employees came in to set up for a private event. One of the employees was the Grace Farms Tea Master, who spoke with us and made us some amazing tea, possibly the third or fourth best tea I have ever had. It was an incredible experience and it makes me think that maybe being Tea Master at Grace Farms might just be the best job in the history of jobs.
This page of the 2023 Weekend Trips Slideshow has a bit of a theme, with local sites around (but not in) New York City. This stop kind of breaks that theme, although “kind of” might be the important part here. This is Sailors Snug Harbor on Staten Island, legally in New York City but, let’s face it, for all intents and purposes it’s not. This was my first time here, not because I was avoiding it as much as that It’s just kind of a pain in the ass to get to that part of the island. I was pleasantly surprised there, and most impressed by the gardens and their walk through green arched vaults. Good job, Staten Island.
I am a hockey fan (or, as you may already know, a New Jersey Devils hockey fan), but I have seen other hockey teams play in their home arena, including the Islanders. I used to go out to Nassau Coliseum to see them play, maybe once every other year. That was one horrible arena, if you had seats near the top you couldn’t even see the scoreboard. After that, I went to one Islander home game at Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn, not a great experience. The problem there was that the arena was designed and specifically sized for a basketball court, and when you threw a larger ice rink in, it wasn’t centered in the building or to the sloped seat layout. So when I saw that the Islanders were getting a new arena near Belmont Park, I made it a point to go see a game in their first season.
There is a lot to like about UBS Arena, and overall the Islanders put on a good presentation (even though they lost the game). Although I do have two specific complaints about my visit. First, during a period break I decided to do a lap around the main concourse to check out the building, and was kind of surprised that the wide concourse turned into a narrow, boring corridor at one end, an odd design decision that is not good. My second problem is my own fault. I decided to take the LIRR there, and used the shuttle train from Jamaica. Getting there was no issue but getting back was crazy. It took like 45 minutes for that train to go what feels like a mile. If you ever go to the game by train, just walk extra to the Elmont stop and wait for the train. Even though the schedule says the shuttle train is faster, it most certainly (for me at least) was not.
