Painter's Folly | |
Location | 1421 Baltimore Pike, Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
---|---|
Coordinates | 39°52′26″N75°34′13″W / 39.87389°N 75.57028°W |
Built | 1856 |
Architect | Samuel Painter |
Architectural style | Italianate |
NRHP reference No. | 100010360 |
Added to NRHP | May 23, 2024 |
Painter's Folly is an Italianate historic house located in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. Purchased by the township in 2018 with the intention of preserving it and turning into a museum, the house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2024. [1]
Painter's Folly was built by a wealthy local farmer named Samuel Painter in 1856, soon after he returned from travels in Europe. The house's ornate Italianate design inspired neighbors to brand it "Painter's Folly." [2] The three-story house spans 58,000 square feet and sits on a four-acre property adjoining the Brandywine Battlefield. [3]
Painter's nephew, Howard Pyle, rented the house as a summer residence, where for years he hosted Brandywine School artists' gatherings and mentored artists, including N. C. Wyeth. Wyeth's son, Andrew Wyeth, later depicted the house in several of his paintings, including Painter's Folly (1989) and Widow's Walk (1990). [4]
Birmingham Township is a township in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 4,085 at the 2020 census.
Pennsbury Township is a township in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 3,604 at the 2010 census.
Andrew Newell Wyeth was an American visual artist, primarily a realist painter, working predominantly in a regionalist style. He believed he was also an abstractionist, portraying subjects in a new, meaningful way. The son of N. C. Wyeth and father of Jamie Wyeth, he was one of the best-known U.S. artists of the middle 20th century. James H. Duff explores the art and lives of the three men in An American Vision: Three Generations of Wyeth Art. Raised with an appreciation of nature, Wyeth took walks that fired his imagination. Henry David Thoreau, Robert Frost, and King Vidor's The Big Parade (1925) inspired him intellectually and artistically. Wyeth featured in a documentary The Metaphor in which he discussed Vidor's influence on the creation of his works of art, like Winter 1946 and Portrait of Ralph Kline. Wyeth was also inspired by Winslow Homer and Renaissance artists.
Newell Convers Wyeth, known as N. C. Wyeth, was an American painter and illustrator. He was a student of Howard Pyle and became one of America's most well-known illustrators. Wyeth created more than 3,000 paintings and illustrated 112 books — 25 of them for Scribner's, the Scribner Classics, which is the body of work for which he is best known. The first of these, Treasure Island, was one of his masterpieces and the proceeds paid for his studio. Wyeth was a realist painter at a time when the camera and photography began to compete with his craft. Sometimes seen as melodramatic, his illustrations were designed to be understood quickly. Wyeth, who was both a painter and an illustrator, understood the difference, and said in 1908, "Painting and illustration cannot be mixed—one cannot merge from one into the other."
Brandywine Creek is a tributary of the Christina River in southeastern Pennsylvania and northern Delaware in the United States. The Lower Brandywine is 20.4 miles (32.8 km) long and is a designated Pennsylvania Scenic River with several tributary streams. The East Branch and West Branch of the creek originate within 2 miles (3 km) of each other on the slopes of Welsh Mountain in Honey Brook Township, Pennsylvania, about 20 miles (32 km) northwest of their confluence.
Chadds Ford Township is an affluent township in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located about 25 miles (40 km) southwest of Philadelphia.
James Browning Wyeth is an American realist painter, son of Andrew Wyeth, and grandson of N.C. Wyeth. He was raised in Chadds Ford Township, Pennsylvania, and is artistic heir to the Brandywine School tradition — painters who worked in the rural Brandywine River area of Delaware and Pennsylvania, portraying its people, animals, and landscape.
The Brandywine Museum of Art is a museum of regional and American art located on U.S. Route 1 in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania on the banks of the Brandywine Creek. The museum showcases the work of Andrew Wyeth, a major American realist painter, and his family: his father N.C. Wyeth, illustrator of many children's classics; his sister Ann Wyeth McCoy, a composer and painter; and his son Jamie Wyeth, a contemporary American realist painter.
Chadds Ford is a census-designated place (CDP) in Delaware and Chester counties, Pennsylvania, United States, comprising the unincorporated communities of Chadds Ford and Chadds Ford Knoll. It was first listed as a CDP prior to the 2020 census.
The Brandywine School was a style of illustration—as well as an artists colony in Wilmington, Delaware and in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, near the Brandywine River—both founded by artist Howard Pyle (1853–1911) at the end of the 19th century. The works produced there were widely published in adventure novels, magazines, and romances in the early 20th century. Pyle’s teachings would influence such notable illustrators as N.C. Wyeth, Maxfield Parrish, Harvey Dunn, and Norman Rockwell. Pyle himself would come to be known as the "Father of American Illustration." Many works related to the Brandywine School may be seen at the Brandywine River Museum of Art, in Chadds Ford.
The Christian C. Sanderson Museum, or simply Sanderson Museum, is a museum of historical artifacts in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located in the Chadds Ford Historic District. The items in the museum were collected over many years by Christian C. Sanderson (1882–1966), a teacher, musician, poet, actor, writer, traveler, radio commentator and local historian. The Sanderson Museum was founded in 1967 by his friend and Brandywine artist Andrew Wyeth.
The N. C. Wyeth House and Studio is a historic house museum and artist's studio on Murphy Road in Chadds Ford Township, Pennsylvania, United States. Beginning with its construction in 1911, it served as the principal home and studio of artist N.C. Wyeth (1882-1945). It was restored to its original appearance around the time of his death. The property is managed by the Brandywine River Museum, which offers tours. It was designated a National Historic Landmark District in 1997.
George Alexis Weymouth, better known as Frolic Weymouth, was an American artist, whip or stager, and conservationist. He served on the United States Commission of Fine Arts in the 1970s and was a member of the Du Pont family.
The Chads House, which was built by John Wyeth Jr. for John Chads, is located in Chadds Ford, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. The house was built after 1712 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 11, 1971. John Chad's widow, Elizabeth, stayed in the house while it was in the line of fire during the Battle of Brandywine. The city of Chadds Ford relied on the spring ford on the property, and thus the city was named after John Chads.
Carolyn Wyeth, daughter of N.C. Wyeth and sister of Andrew Wyeth, was a well-known artist in her own right. Her hometown was Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. She worked and taught out of N. C. Wyeth House and Studio. Her nephew, Jamie Wyeth was one of her students.
The Barns-Brinton House is an historic brick house located between Hamorton and Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania in Pennsbury Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. It was constructed in 1714 by William Barns, who operated it as a tavern from 1722 until his death in 1731.
The Kuerner Farm, also known as Ring Farm, is an historic farm which is located in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, United States. It is notable for its association with artist Andrew Wyeth, who created about one-third of his work, more than 1,000 paintings and drawings, on subjects he found there during a span of seventy-seven years.
Chadds Ford Historic District is a national historic district located at Chadds Ford Township, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. The district includes 17 contributing buildings in Chadds Ford village. Notable buildings include the Chads Ford Inn (1807-1810), Merchant Mill (1864), a row of houses built between 1840 and 1850, the bridge across Brandywine Creek, and the Christian C. Sanderson Museum. Located in the district are the separately listed Chad House and N. C. Wyeth House and Studio.
Brinton's Mill, also known as The Mill at Brinton's Bridge, is a historic grist mill located in Birmingham Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. The mill was built about 1720, expanded in 1769, and renovated in 1824. The granary was built about 1824, when the mill was expanded. Also on the property is a stone dwelling constructed in the 1920s and built on the foundation of an early 18th-century dwelling. During the Battle of Brandywine in September 1777, General John Sullivan and his troops were bivouacked at the adjacent Brinton's Ford. In the early 1970s, the mill property was owned by artist Andrew Wyeth. In 1958, Andrew and Betsy Wyeth purchased and restored "The Mill," a group of 18th-century buildings that appeared often in his work, including Night Sleeper (1979).
American composer, pianist and painter Ann Wyeth McCoy was the youngest daughter of artist-illustrator N.C. Wyeth and the fourth of his five children. She was born in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania.