A
visit to the Philip Johnson Glass House resulted in a heap of pics that look much
like all the others so we'll spare you. Also on the property are a bunch of
other buildings and structures by Johnson that are not in the classic style of the
Glass House and most of them exude a sniff of outdated whimsy. And of course as
Johnson was also a major art collector and super-patron of MoMA there are also
two art galleries on the estate. One is a rather airless subterranean painting
gallery and the other is set up for sculpture (you can see some pics we took
here).
The big surprise in the painting gallery (ok shock really) was to find that the famous movable walls were covered, Austin Powers-like, in carpet. Yes, carpet was a Philip Johnson favourite that he'd used as early as the sixties in the Kreeger house. Somehow he convinced his clients that laying fireproofed beige cotton carpet over plaster would highlight the art while providing ease of installation (no visible nail holes, no touching up). In his enthusiasm he forgot to mention one small fact: while it looks ok at a distance in photographs it looks plain weird close up. Still if weird is what you want, you can see how to lay carpet on a wall here.
The big surprise in the painting gallery (ok shock really) was to find that the famous movable walls were covered, Austin Powers-like, in carpet. Yes, carpet was a Philip Johnson favourite that he'd used as early as the sixties in the Kreeger house. Somehow he convinced his clients that laying fireproofed beige cotton carpet over plaster would highlight the art while providing ease of installation (no visible nail holes, no touching up). In his enthusiasm he forgot to mention one small fact: while it looks ok at a distance in photographs it looks plain weird close up. Still if weird is what you want, you can see how to lay carpet on a wall here.
Images: Top
Philip Johnson’s painting gallery and bottom, yes that’s carpet.
