The Olana State Historic Site in Greenport, New York, is getting a big makeover. The 150-year-old house museum and surrounding landscape will be renovated over the next two years with help from state and private funding. Governor Kathy Hochul announced the news on December 13.
The Frederic Church Center for Art and Landscape, a new visitor center that will be carbon-neutral and all-electric, will be built on the 250-acre site of the historic mansion. Additional projects will include the construction of a maintenance facility and Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant parking area, the rehabilitation of a dam and spillway, the integration of native plant species and outdoor lighting that reduces light pollution, and the construction of a new exterior paint job for the mansion.
“The new projects will build on the legacy of Olana—the visionary home, studio and landscape design of artist Frederic Church and his family,” Hochul said in a statement. “The Frederic Church Center will add to this canvas and help to welcome patrons to one of the most strikingly beautiful places in New York State.”
Olana, the home of Church and his wife, Isabel Church, from 1872 until their deaths at the turn of the century, is a well-preserved Victorian-Moorish estate on a hill that is popular with tourists. The estate is filled with Church’s paintings, sketches, and objects he collected throughout his lifetime. Today, the eclectic time capsule draws more than 200,000 visitors annually. However, it was once under threat of destruction: in the 1960s, at a time when Victorian architecture was unpopular, one of the family’s heirs planned to sell the then-crumbling house and its contents. A successful preservation campaign led to its designation as a National Historic Landmark in 1965 and its purchase by the State of New York the following year.
The Frederic Church Center is set to begin construction in the spring of 2023 and is expected to open in the spring of 2024. The $25m project will restore the Churches’ bedroom suite and a guest room, as well as restore Crown Hill, a landscape feature that offers panoramic views over the complex.
“Fifty-six years ago private citizens and New York State joined together to save Olana from destruction,” Sean Sawyer, president of the Olana Partnership, the nonprofit that supports the site, said in a statement. “The Olana Partnership is thrilled to mark the next, brilliant chapter in Olana’s story, one in which the commitment of our board and supporters has been joined by New York State to make the fullness of Frederic Church’s vision apparent for new generations.”