Monday, January 30, 2012

'Arlough'

'Arlough', the Robert Low Bacon estate designed by John Russell Pope c. 1916 in Old Westbury. Bacon was a member of the United States Congress from New York's 1st District from 1923-1938. He built 'Arlough' on a piece of his father Robert Bacon's estate 'Old Acres' which sat next door. In 1938 while on his way home from an engagement in NYC, Bacon suffered a heart attack and died in his car on the Northern State Parkway near Lake Success. Click HERE to see 'Arlough' on google earth and HERE on bing. Click HERE to see photos of the house taken by Nassau County.






Photos from American Architect & Architecture, 1920.

17 comments:

The Down East Dilettante said...

Such dumpy furniture for such a stylish house. Mrs. Bacon's Washington House is similarly furnished.

gorgeous staircase

Charles said...

The rennovation looks like it was beautifully done in the Nassau County pictures. The house looks huge!

The Devoted Classicist said...

The recent photos in the link show the new additions. With so many tear-downs, I am glad the house has survived.

That original pair of small oriel windows on the second floor of the service wing are curious, aren't they? Perhaps they helped to monitor comings and goings.

archibuff said...

So is the enormous reflecting pool sitting at an odd angle to the house and in a grassy field far off to the northwest from Arlough itself a leftover from the garden of Old Acres or a just an oddity of the landscape designer?

Good looking property non-the-less.

Glen said...

Very nice. I agree it is nice this house and so many landscape features have been preserved. The addition at the end of the original service wing was quite well done and seamless to the original house. I'm not as keen on the more recent addition on the opposite side of the forecourt. But I am baffled by the picture of what appears to be the living room becuase its layout does not match any of the rooms on the main floor plan below it, nor does it seem reasonable that it would be any room on the second floor. Am I just having a Monday or does anyone else find this a mystery?

Zach L. said...

Additional views tomorrow.

Doug Floor Plan said...

Glen, you beat me to the very points I was going to make, especially the room photograph question. Even if the room photo was reversed it wouldn't be any of the rooms on the ground floor & there is no way this is a second floor room. I have seen other examples in these magazines where a photo was misidentified ... I'm sure it was someone's living room somewhere (with dumpy furniture).

lil' gay boy said...

Another one for the picture mis-attribution –––– it doesn't conform to any room on the first floor, and I don't see how it could be on the second with the fireplace in that position...I wonder whose living room it is?

I've always loved this house; it has such a nuanced execution that its monumentality is deceptive...much in the way Pope's Caumsett is ––– large but surprisingly domestic, an almost Trumbauer-esque effect.

The Ancient said...

Happy families are all alike ---

Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato

(When Morgan père hired his grandfather -- Robert Bacon -- people at the firm joked that the old man had taken him on as much for his good looks as his business skills.)

Laura from RI said...

Did the Bacons own racehorses, trotters or showhorses (hackneys) because of the track on their property. Also too, looks like there are gravestones & a "winners circle" oval in the infield of the track. Curious.

lil' gay boy said...

Anyone know where Old Acres,in relation to Arlough and Homes Acres, stood? My guess is the large reflecting pool was a feature of Daddy's estate.

Perhaps young David should have stayed home and found himself a nice chauffeur a la Sabrina...

Perhaps not.

Accord to William J. Mann, young David was romantically involved with the ever-overweight Laird Cregar, who would die little more than a year after him following a disastrous diet.

The Down East Dilettante said...

I'll be damned. Indeed there is no way that room is there (although I stand by the dumpy furniture remark--lots of sort of drab Victorian stuff at Bacon house.

Lil Gay Boy, did I miss something in the conversation? Who's young David?

As to the reflecting pool, I don't find the angle odd at all---it is distant from the house, so doesn't have the axial necessity of garden features that are on house axis, and seems to be quite carefully and artfully aligned with the driveway curves. But what do I know about these things?

The Down East Dilettante said...

PS, whoever this young David is, technically shouldn't he have found a chauffeur's son to be a la Sabrina?

The Down East Dilettante said...

PS, as long as I'm on a roll--I have to firmly disagree that the new addition is well done. It doesn't join well with the existing house, and though it copies the roof line and dormers, that lack of connection is bad. And there's that busy and odd little classical gazebo--or is it the transitional space? The windows are just wrong, and that little wooden pavilion with the air conditioning unit is just bad, bad, bad. And what's with that clunky and most Un-Pope entrance portico? Although the older pictures here don't give a clear shot of the entrance, the original was far subtler and more elegantly calibrated.

Clearly the architect had decent intentions, but he needed another year studying the classics. I give it a C-

It's a shame. EVERYBODY seems to think they need to add to perfection these days. NOBODY can leave a good design alone.

Zach L. said...

I have removed the photo that AA&A mislabeled.

HalfPuddingHalfSauce said...

LGB

http://wikimapia.org/#lat=40.7699468&lon=-73.6112309&z=15&l=0&m=b&show=/20273275/Outbuildings-and-Gardens-from-Old-Acres

Follow the Historic Aerials link to see "Old Acres" still standing.

As far as that pond - based on the tree lines that mark property boundaries - to me it looks to have belonged to Old Acres. Probably used as water supply/retention to the farm group.

Anonymous said...

Young David was the son who went on to Hollywood and became the Masked Marvel, and was mysteriously murdered in the early 40's....still unsolved.