Come to the Groundbreaking Event
Thursday July 3, 2014, 10 am
We’re on our way! Join us for the official start of the project to reconstruct Thomas Cole’s New Studio. Giving remarks at the event will be Rose Harvey, New York State Parks Commissioner; Peter Lopez, New York State Assemblyman; John Mesick, the project’s architect; as well as Betsy Jacks and Lisa Fox Martin of the Thomas Cole National Historic Site.
Over the past decade we’ve been collecting any and all known photographs of the New Studio building, built in 1846 and demolished in 1973. Because the demolition was so recent, we are hoping that additional photographs will surface. Do you have or know someone who has an image of the building? If so, please contact us! Here are some of the images we’ve obtained so far. The sepia-toned photograph at right shows the building in a state of extreme disrepair, but the image is not dated and we have no information about the date. Below are two other photographs, but again with no date. Both of them show the building set among the trees of an old orchard, atop a grassy knoll. All of the known images show the building from this same angle — from the northwest looking southeast. The west facade has two enormous windows that face the Catskills. The north facade has an entrance porch. We have yet to find a single image of the east facade of the building.
It is with great excitement that we publicly launch the project to reconstruct Thomas Cole’s New Studio! This page will be continually updated with the latest news as the project progresses, and it will serve as a source for the history of the building, surviving historic photographs, etc.
To begin, we would like to share with you a photograph of the building from 1964 — an image that we just became aware of this week. It had never been seen by our staff or the project’s architect until now. The leaves are off of the trees, allowing a clearer view of the north-facing porch and entrance. By this time, the delicate arched trimwork from the eaves of the building is missing, as are the shutters on the west-facing windows, but the wooden acorn detail is still visible on the corner of the roofline.
For contrast, included here below is a photograph from around 1900. Thomas Cole’s daughter Emily can be seen near the entrance portico, giving you an idea of the scale of the building. Our reconstruction will painstakingly follow Thomas Cole’s original design, as seen below.
