Gropius House

About this property

The Gropius House is a historic house museum at 68 Baker Bridge Road in Lincoln, Massachusetts, United States. Designed by Bauhaus architect Walter Gropius and his partner Marcel Breuer in the modern style, the two-story, wood-frame structure was completed in 1938. The house was originally the residence of Gropius, his wife Ise (née Frank), and their daughter Ati. It occupies the center of a hill on an approximately 5.5-acre (2.2 ha) property. Its materials and architectural details, though modernist and relatively simple, were intended to evoke similarities to other New England buildings. Operated by Historic New England since 1985, the house includes a collection of Bauhaus-related items. The design, an early example of modernist residential architecture in the eastern United States, has received extensive commentary on its juxtaposition of traditional and modernist design elements. The building is designated a National Historic Landmark and is part of the Woods End Road Historic District. The site is extensively landscaped with retaining walls and plantings—which Gropius intended would integrate the building's architecture with the surrounding landscape—and also includes a garage. The house spans approximately 2,300 square feet (210 m2), with a largely rectangular massing. The facade is made of vertical wooden planks interspersed with casement windows and sash windows. The exterior incorporates elements such as a spiral staircase, an entrance marquee, a rear porch, and protruding trellises. There is a second-story outdoor deck and a partially-enclosed flat roof. The interior spaces are grouped around a central stair hall, and they are decorated with furniture from the Gropius family's previous homes, along with objects acquired by or donated to the family. The first story has a study, living room, dining room, kitchen, pantry, and maid's room. The second story contains three bedrooms and partially overhangs the first story. Gropius, the founder of the Bauhaus art school, fled Nazi Germany in 1934 and settled in the US in 1937. Initially, the family rented properties around Boston before deciding to construct a home in Lincoln. Gropius obtained land and financing from the philanthropist Helen Storrow. A local contractor, Casper J. Jenney, built the house between March and September 1938. The home attracted attention for its modernist design and was often used by Gropius's students and guests. Though Ati moved out during the 1940s, Walter lived at the Gropius House until his death in 1969. Ise donated the property to the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities (SPNEA; later Historic New England) by 1975. After Ise died in 1983, the building opened as a historic house museum on June 1, 1985, and has undergone multiple restorations since then.

Location

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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