From Rags toBrushes
1800 House gets facelift, becomes classroom for art
BY LAURA RASKIN

INDEPENDENT ARTS WRITER


Just a few years ago, visitors

Chris Hart, program coordinator for the 1800 house, points to a mirror that hangs in one of the refurbished bedrooms. The mirror is an example of reverse painting on glass, a popular craft in the early 19th century. PHOTO BY MARK MATTOON

to the 1800 House at

4 Mill St. would have been hard-pressed to imagine women of the 19th century sitting around its fireplace embroidering or entertaining guests in its parlor.

The front and sides of the house — an NHA property since 1951 — looked fine from the outside, but it was a pretty face on a building that had fallen into disrepair and neglect.

After 18 months of renovation, the house is almost ready for visitors again. The NHA included the house, actually built in 1801, in their capital campaign plan and now it will host the association’s first-ever program dedicated to the island’s history of decorative arts and crafts.

“It was in pretty rough shape. Part of its foundation was suffering and needed attention,” said Niles Parker, the Robyn and John Davis Curator of the NHA. The house had been a museum briefly, but was not filled with any of its original contents.

“It was just a shell for artifacts from the NHA collection,” said Parker. In refurbishing the house, he has attempted to fill it with NHA artifacts from the time the house was built, as well as with similar pieces on loan from Wayne Pratt Antiques.

“We were trying to find furnishings that will be of the period of the house to create a context for the classes,” said Parker. “We wanted to make it really lived-in and comfortable.”

Construction workers were still banging away on Friday, but the house looked nearly complete and back to its roots.

Built by Richard Coleman, the house was inhabited by Jeremiah Lawrence, the island’s part-time sheriff. He could easily walk to the jail – the Old Gaol on Vestal Street, another NHA property – and most likely used the house as a dry goods store and millinery, said Parker.

From Top: Niles Parker, the Robyn and John Davis Curator of the NHA, describes what would have been in the formal parlor of the newly restored 1800 House on Mill Street; a bedroom of the 1800 House decorated as it might have been in 1801; Valerie and Richard Norton, of Norton Preservation Trust, were completing the finishing touches on the house last week. PHOTOS BY MARK MATTOON

Many of the original details had been left untouched when it was inherited by the NHA. The house has only seen about six owners, said Chris Hart, program coordinator for the 1800 House.

It is a classic Nantucket home of its time, with a center chimney and two parlors. The parlor to the right of the front door was the more formal of the two.

“(The Lawrences) wouldn’t have had a lot of what was in a shipowner’s home, but they were upper middle class,” said Hart. The furniture in the informal parlor, where some classes will take place, is pushed up against the wall.

“They only took it out when they were using it, probably because it was so dark, they’d trip over it,” said Hart.

A circa 1817 portrait of Mary Starbuck hangs in the informal parlor, and a sickly looking child, Phoebe Starbuck. The child died soon after Nantucket artist Sally Gardner completed the painting.

While some details of the back of the house have been preserved, such as an exposed wall, it had to be redone with an attempt to mimic the antique details of the rest of the house.

“There were a myriad of issues in putting this house back together. It was in serious disrepair,” said Richard Norton, of Norton Preservation Trust. “There were a lot of sections that were falling down, the roof had not been touched for 40 or 50 years. You could look through the (back) wall to the outside. There was a beam that had a buckle in it that scared the engineers.”

Norton and his wife Valerie are accustomed to restoring old buildings in keeping with their history, but the 1800 house provided a special challenge.

“Where do you start?,” Richard recalled thinking.

“They’ve done a great job, being able to save so much of it and bring it back,” said Parker, who reported that about $700,000 has been spent on the project.

“Being able to save so much of the original fabric is great. What’s really exciting is the classroom idea, in the context of a 19th century house,” he said.

Hart has arranged for talented artists, on-island and off, to teach decorative arts classes in the house.

Reverse painting on glass, crewel embroidery, rug hooking and silhouette demonstrations will be offered through Columbus Day, said Hart. Whatever work the students do in class they can then see in the Whaling Museum.

Stenciling on velvet, or theorems, will also be offered.

“That happened when embroidery fell into decline,” said Hart. “Embroidery was done on the island, probably in this very house.”

Once a neo-natal nurse, Hart may not be the most obvious to coordinate the 1800 House programs.

“I’ve always been interested in the decorative arts and crafts. My earliest memories are of my grandfather teaching me to knit,” said Hart. Her grandfather was a soldier in World War I and had to be able to knit his own socks, she said. “I truly appreciate the mastery some of these people have in their art form.”

The 1800 House launch celebrations run through July 15. For a complete list of program or to preregister for classes through October, call 228-1894, ext. 1.

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