Tuesday, July 07, 2009

Gardner carriage house RIP















The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston began tearing down "Mrs. Jack"'s lovely carriage house (pictured above in March) yesterday to make way for a Renzo Piano-designed expansion of the museum. Neighbors, preservationists and even Gardner staff fought the demolition, but with the museum receiving the necessary governmental approvals, Gardner leaders pushed ahead with the destruction.

Katherine Armstrong tells The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research:
"abatement and removal of the carriage house is an ongoing process, part of enabling and site preparation work for the museum’s new building and museum preservation project that is also ongoing this summer. Enabling and site preparation work began in late May. In addition to abatement and removal of the carriage house, and existing greenhouses, this work includes art and architectural salvage work, and the digging of geothermal wells, among other work. This enabling and site preparation work is expected to continue throughout the summer. We expect to break ground on the new building sometime this fall."
Previously:
March 5, 2009: Court oks Gardner expansion, demolition.
March 9, 2009: Gardner buildings slated for demolition.

Update July 8: Thanks to an anonymous commenter below who offers links to early 20th century photos of the carriage house and video of its demolition. If you have photos of the interior of the place, please get in touch.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Historic photographs of the building as Gardner created it can be found here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/40229011@N03/3702788940/in/photostream/

Here is a Youtube video of teh demolition: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ys6u17j_KpU

July 8, 2009 at 8:34 PM  

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