Andalusia | |
![]() Andalusia in 1976 | |
Location of Andalusia in Pennsylvania | |
Location | 1237 State Road, Andalusia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
---|---|
Nearest city | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Coordinates | 40°3′43″N74°57′30″W / 40.06194°N 74.95833°W |
Area | 225 acres (91 ha) |
Built | 1794 |
Architect | Benjamin Latrobe, Thomas U. Walter |
Architectural style | Colonial Revival, Greek Revival |
NRHP reference No. | 66000649 [1] |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | November 13, 1966 |
Designated NHL | November 13, 1966 [2] |
Designated PHMC | November 01, 2001 [3] |
Andalusia, also known as the Nicholas Biddle Estate, is a historic mansion and estate located on the Delaware River, just northeast of Philadelphia, in Bensalem Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The community surrounding it, Andalusia, takes its name from the 225-acre estate.
The original house was built in 1794 by John Craig, who named it after the Andalusia region of Spain. Craig hired architect Benjamin Latrobe to expand the house in 1806 in a Greek Revival style. In 1811, Craig's daughter Jane married prominent financier Nicholas Biddle (1786–1844). Biddle and architect Thomas U. Walter expanded the house into a mansion in 1834–36. Walter is best known for his design for the dome of the United States Capitol.
Their most dramatic addition was a two-and-a-half-story wing, surrounded on three sides by massive Doric columns, that thrust southward toward the river. This contained twin parlors on the main floor, divided by pocket doors that could be opened to create a single room. The wing ended in a portico, one that has become an icon of Greek Revival architecture. Across the north façade, a two-story block of new rooms created a grand entrance and service spaces. Some of Latrobe's 1806 spaces were retained in the 1830s alterations, including twin rooms with semi-octagonal ends.
Notable Biddle family members include Nicholas's brother Commodore James Biddle (1783–1848), son Congressman Charles John Biddle (1819–1873), great-grandson and aviator Charles John Biddle (1890–1972), and great-great-grandson and National Trust for Historic Preservation president James "Jimmy" Biddle (1929–2005). The property remains in the Biddle family.
The house was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1966. [2] [4] According to the National Park Service, "Andalusia is one of the earliest and most pristine examples of the Greek Revival style in the country." [2] Today it is operated as a house museum.
Benjamin Henry Boneval Latrobe was an Anglo-American neoclassical architect who emigrated to the United States. He was one of the first formally trained, professional architects in the new United States, drawing on influences from his travels in Italy, as well as British and French Neoclassical architects such as Claude Nicolas Ledoux. In his thirties, he emigrated to the new United States and designed the United States Capitol, on "Capitol Hill" in Washington, D.C., as well as the Old Baltimore Cathedral or The Baltimore Basilica,. It is the first Cathedral constructed in the United States for any Christian denomination. Latrobe also designed the largest structure in America at the time, the "Merchants' Exchange" in Baltimore. With extensive balconied atriums through the wings and a large central rotunda under a low dome which dominated the city, it was completed in 1820 after five years of work and endured into the early twentieth century.
The Greek Revival was an architectural movement which began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe and the United States and Canada and in Greece itself following its independence in 1832. It revived many aspects of the forms and styles of ancient Greek architecture, in particular the Greek temple. A product of Hellenism, Greek Revival architecture is looked upon as the last phase in the development of Neoclassical architecture, which was drawn from Roman architecture. The term was first used by Charles Robert Cockerell in a lecture he gave as an architecture professor at the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 1842.
Federal-style architecture is the name for the classical architecture built in the United States following the American Revolution between c. 1780 and 1830, and particularly from 1785 to 1815, which was influenced heavily by the works of Andrea Palladio with several innovations on Palladian architecture by Thomas Jefferson and his contemporaries. Jefferson's Monticello estate and several federal government buildings, including the White House, are among the two most prominent examples of buildings constructed in Federal style.
William Strickland, was a noted architect and civil engineer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Nashville, Tennessee. A student of Benjamin Latrobe and mentor to Thomas Ustick Walter, Strickland helped establish the Greek Revival movement in the United States. A pioneering engineer, he wrote a seminal book on railroad construction, helped build several early American railroads, and designed the first ocean breakwater in the Western Hemisphere. He was elected as a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1820.
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The Woodlands is a National Historic Landmark District on the west bank of the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia. It includes a Federal-style mansion, a matching carriage house and stable, and a garden landscape that in 1840 was transformed into a Victorian rural cemetery with an arboretum of over 1,000 trees. More than 30,000 people are buried at the cemetery. Among the tombstones at Woodlands cemetery is the tombstone of Dr Thomas W. Evans, which at 150 feet, is both the tallest gravestone in the United States and the tallest obelisk gravestone in the world.
Andalusia is a historic neighborhood and unincorporated community in Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania, United States. It borders Philadelphia along the Poquessing Creek. It shares the Bensalem Township ZIP Code, 19020, with surrounding CDP's including Cornwells Heights. The area is the southernmost part of the township and of the county. Its boundaries are: Woodhaven Road to the northeast, the Delaware River to the east and south, and Poquessing Creek to the north and west. Interstate 95 - Delaware Expressway runs through its southeastern section near the Delaware River. The neighborhood takes its name from Andalusia, the estate of Philadelphia financier Nicholas Biddle (1786–1844), now preserved as a National Historic Landmark.
Hope Lodge is a historic building located at 553 South Bethlehem Pike in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania, in the United States. This mansion has been described as "one of the finest examples of Georgian Colonial architecture in this part of the country. It was used by Continental troops during the 1777 Philadelphia Campaign during the American Revolution.
Hyde Hall is a neoclassical country mansion in Springfield Center, New York, designed by architect Philip Hooker for George Clarke (1768–1835), a wealthy landowner. The house was constructed between 1817 and 1834, and designed with English and American architectural features. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1986 for its architecture, and the completeness of its architectural documentary record. It is one of the few surviving works of Philip Hooker, a leading 19th-century American architect.
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The Latrobe Gate is a historic gatehouse located at the Washington Navy Yard in Southeast Washington, D.C. Built in 1806 and substantially altered in 1881, the ceremonial entrance to the U.S. Navy's oldest shore establishment is an example of Greek Revival and Italianate architecture. It was designed by the second Architect of the Capitol Benjamin Henry Latrobe, whose works include St. John's Episcopal Church, the Baltimore Basilica, and the United States Capitol. The Latrobe Gate is one of the nation's oldest extant examples of Greek Revival architecture. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 14, 1973, and is a contributing property to the Washington Navy Yard's status as a National Historic Landmark.
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(help) and Accompanying 4 photos, exterior, from 1966 and undated. (1.04 MB)