Boston Flora

Tag: Beauport

  • Wednesday, March 8, 6:30 pm Eastern – Trailblazers and Trendsetters: Beauport, Live and Online

    Morven Museum & Garden is pleased to present the 2023 Grand Homes & Gardens Speaker Series: Trailblazers and Trendsetters. Join us as we explore the people and spaces, past and present, who cultivated new opportunities and inspired breakthrough trends for future generations of landscape architects, designers, entrepreneurs, and horticulturalists. Today, these places continue the work of preserving historic and natural landscapes for public benefit and community engagement. The 2023 series will feature Manitoga, Villa Lewaro, Beauport – The Sleeper McCann House, and Bartram’s Garden. On March 8 at 6:30 pm, explore the unique and ornate designs in the summer home of one of America’s first professional interior designers, Henry Davis Sleeper.

    Henry Davis Sleeper set many trends as one of America’s first professional interior designers. Sleeper’s unique and ornate design concepts were showcased throughout his summer home, Beauport, in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Here he hosted a regular cohort of artists and intellectuals, navigating early twentieth century society as a gay man. Presented by Kristen Weiss, the Cape Ann site manager at Historic New England, this talk will examine Sleeper’s groundbreaking interior designs, still featured in the house today, as well as Beauport’s architecture and arts and crafts landscape design.

    Please note that our speaker will present this program virtually. The talk will be streamed live for an in-person and virtual audience alike. Speaker Kristen Weiss is the Cape Ann site manager at Historic New England; managing Beauport, the Sleeper-McCann House in Gloucester, Mass. and Cogswell’s Grant in Essex, Mass. She previously worked in the American Decorative Arts department at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass. She has developed multiple tours and lectures on historic sites, landscapes, and collections with a focus on American folk art. With an undergraduate degree in History and graduate work in Museum Studies and in Preservation Studies, Kristen has been working with museum collections and historic houses for over twenty-five years. $10 – $30 – Register HERE.

  • Wednesday, February 22, 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm Eastern- Trailblazers and Trendsetters: Manitoga, Live and Online

    Morven Museum & Garden is pleased to present the 2023 Grand Homes & Gardens Speaker Series: Trailblazers and Trendsetters. Join us as we explore the people and spaces, past and present, who cultivated new opportunities and inspired breakthrough trends for future generations of landscape architects, designers, entrepreneurs, and horticulturalists. Today, these places continue the work of preserving historic and natural landscapes for public benefit and community engagement. The 2023 series will feature Manitoga, Villa Lewaro, Beauport – The Sleeper McCann House, and Bartram’s Garden.
    This year’s Grand Homes & Gardens Speaker Series Sponsor is Hiltons Princeton.

    On Wednesday, February 22, the series kicks off with an examination of designer Russel Wright’s trendsetting mid-century aesthetic through the lens of his iconic home, Manitoga. This program is sponsored by David Schure & Grant Wagner of Callaway Henderson Sotheby’s International Realty.

    Russel Wright and his wife Mary shaped modern American design through their iconic dinnerware, furniture, and home accessories ultimately impacting how many Americans organized and lived in their homes in the mid-twentieth century. Manitoga, Wright’s 1960s home in Garrison, New York, stands alone as an iconic and idiosyncratic example of eco-sensitive modernist architecture. The home’s 75-acre woodland garden, a reclaimed quarry restored to its “natural setting,” is a key illustration of the ecological aesthetic in landscape architecture.

    Speaker Vivian Linares, Director of Collections, Interpretation, and Preservation at Manitoga, will explore Russel and Mary Wright’s contributions to American design and the home’s representation of their trendsetting aesthetic.

    All programs will be offered in a hybrid format allowing participants to join in-person or virtually. Tickets are available for individual programs or as series tickets including all four weeks of programming. To register for series tickets, please visit this page. Ticket prices range from $30 (individual) to $90 (series). General public virtual series price is $70 for all four programs.

    The in-person program includes light refreshments featuring a cocktail and mocktail inspired by each week’s featured site. Online participants will receive recipes to make the featured cocktail and mocktail at home.

    Programs begin at 6:30 p.m. Doors and the virtual waiting room open at 6:00 p.m. A Zoom link will be sent to all virtual participants upon registration.

  • Wednesday, September 14, 10:30 am – Garden Club of the Back Bay September Meeting: Beauport, Sleeper-McCann House

    The Garden Club of the Back Bay kicks off the 2022/2023 year with a field trip to Beauport, the Sleeper-McCann House, operated by Historic New England. There will be a docent-led tour of the 25-room house and gardens in Gloucester, followed by an optional box lunch meal at a local yacht club just down the street from Beauport. Members will receive notification and sign up details.

    Beauport, the Sleeper-McCann House, a National Historic Landmark, was the summer home of one of American’s first professional interior designers, Henry Davis Sleeper. Perched on a rock ledge overlooking Gloucester Harbor, Beauport was Sleeper’s retreat, backdrop for entertaining, and professional showcase, and an inspiration to all who visited.

    After Sleeper’s death, Beauport was purchased by the McCanns, who left it largely intact. Visit Beauport and see Sleeper’s lifetime collection of curiosities, colored glass, folk art, china, and silhouettes in every nook and alcove. Each of the forty rooms is distinguished by a historical or literary figure, theme, color, shape, or object. No two rooms are the same, and each is more visually dazzling than the last. Get to know Sleeper, a gay man living in the early twentieth century; his housekeeper, Mary Wonson; his fascinating neighbors; and the house’s many colorful guests.

  • Thursday, July 30, 2:30 pm – 4:30 pm – Afternoon Tea at Beauport

    Bring friends and family on Thursday, July 30 from 2:30 – 4:30 to an elegant tea at Beauport, the Sleeper-McCann House, 75 Eastern Point Boulevard, on the terrace overlooking Gloucester Harbor. The tea includes scones, finger sandwiches, and sweets, and is accompanied by a classical guitarist playing in the background. A tour of the house is offered after tea. Sunhats are recommended. $25 Historic New England members, $35 nonmembers. Registration is required. Please call 978-283-0800 or buy online at http://shop.historicnewengland.org/BEA-TEA-7491/. Rain date August 6.

  • Friday, June 17, 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm – An Evening in Sleeper’s Garden

    On Friday evening, June 17, beginning at 6:30 pm, enjoy refreshments in the horseshoe garden at Beauport, 75 Eastern Point Boulevard in Gloucester, and a presentation by Property Care Team Leaders Ben Haavik and Reed Hilderbrand, and landscape architect Joe James, who discuss the landscape restoration project at Beauport. Beauport gardener Marcia Hart is also on hand to talk about specific plant material and how to implement and maintain the historic garden design. Reservations are required. Free to Garden and Landscape members of Historic New England, $20 for HNE members. For more information, and to register, log on to www.historicnewengland.org.

  • Sunday, May 1, 12:00 noon – Wednesday, May 4, 2:00 pm – 19th Annual Newport Symposium: Great Places

    What makes a great place? The 2011 Newport Symposium, May 2 to May 4, will answer that question, examining the great places of the world and their creators, whether stately houses, gardens, galleries of art treasures, or entire cities. The illustrious line-up of international speakers for our 19th annual Symposium is available online, or call Patricia Peterson at (401) 847-1000 ext. 154 for more information and to register.  Highlights include a pre-symposium tour of Great Places in Colonial Newport: Hunter House and The Samuel Whitehorne House, an opening reception at The Elms, Piranesi’s Rome: The Imagination of an Archaeological Fantasy, Gondola Days: Venice in the American Imagination, Illusions of Grandeur: Chick Austin’s Stage-Set House (pictured below), Beauport: Henry Davis Sleeper’s Eclectic Showpiece, The Grandest Room in the Colonies: The Cadwalader Furniture Rediscovered, Great Galleries: Great Spaces for Art and Science, Dumfries House, A Timeless Place: The Chateau de Montgeoffroy, tours and dinner at The Breakers.

  • Friday, June 19 – Sunday, June 21 -Cape Ann Garden Festival

    Friday, June 19, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.    Beauport Reception and Talk $20/$15 members
    Enjoy an evening reception with wine, beer, and appetizers in the garden overlooking Gloucester Harbor and hear about the newly uncovered garden staircase that is part of the stunning new garden renovation at Beauport, The Sleeper-McCann House, a property of Historic New England.

    Saturday, June 20, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.    Garden Tour $35
    Tour glorious gardens with magnificent plantings and stunning vistas. This year new stops on the tour feature sculpture gardens, water views, private quarries and fabulous perennial and herb gardens. In addition several of the homes will be open for visitors’ viewing.

    Sunday, June 21,      Workshops, Lecture and Exhibition Tour

    10 a.m.-11 a.m. Planning a Garden for People and Pollinators, Kim Smith $15

    Author of Oh Garden of Fresh Possibilities! and an inspired designer and illustrator, Kim will talk about the ways to make a garden both beautiful for people and attractive to birds and butterflies.  Join us for a lecture and booksigning.

    11:30 a.m. -1:00 p.m. The Herb Garden in 18th Century New England, Judy Hallberg $20

    Herbs provide interesting foliage and are also the basis for lotions and salves with healing properties. Learn about herbs and the ways in which they were gardened and used in the 1700s. Judy Hallberg works with the 17th and 18th century gardens of the Ipswich Historical Society and recently completed restoration of the society’s 17th century Housewife’s Herb Garden.

    1:30 p.m. -2:30 p.m. Cape Ann Museum, Docent-led tour of the exhibit “A View from the Terrace” Free

    Free to Garden Festival ticket holders. The Museum is located at 27 Pleasant St., Gloucester. Call Jeanette Smith at 978-283-0455, extension 11 for reservations.

    3:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Growing and Propagating Antique Roses, Peggy J. Flanagan $20, materials incl.

    Old Garden Roses are rewarding and easy to grow using organic methods. You’ll learn how to plant, prune and care for these beautiful roses. Each person will take home a potted rose cutting. Bring gloves and a pair of pruners. Peggy J. Flanagan is a landscape designer and an adjunct instructor in the landscape design program at North Shore Community College. She specializes in the history of New England gardening.

    For more information, and to purchase tickets on-line, log on to www.sargenthouse.org.  Tickets are also available at the Weathervane, 153 Main Street, Gloucester, and at the Sargent House Museum, 49 Middle Street, Gloucester, Massachusetts.