Olana
About this property
Olana State Historic Site is a historic house museum and landscape in Greenport, New York, near the city of Hudson. The estate was home to Frederic Edwin Church (1826–1900), one of the major figures in the Hudson River School of landscape painting. The centerpiece of Olana is an eclectic villa which overlooks parkland and a working farm designed by the artist. The residence has a wide view of the Hudson River Valley, the Catskill Mountains and the Taconic Range. Church and his wife Isabel (1836–1899) named their estate after a fortress-treasure house in ancient Greater Persia (modern-day Armenia), which also overlooked a river valley. Olana is one of the few intact artists' home-, studio- and estate-complexes in the United States; it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965. The house is also a prime example of Orientalist architecture. It is owned and operated by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, and is also supported by The Olana Partnership, a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. The main building is an architectural masterpiece designed by Frederic Church in consultation with the architect Calvert Vaux. The stone, brick, and polychrome-stenciled villa is a mixture of Moroccan, Victorian, Persian and Moorish styles. The interior remains much as it was during Church's lifetime, exotically furnished and decorated with objects from his global travels, and with some 40 paintings by Church and his friends. The house is intricately stenciled inside and out; Church designed the stencils based on his travels in the Middle East. The house contains Church's last studio, built as an addition from 1888 to 1890.
Location
Categories
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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Questions about this property
When was Olana listed on the National Register?
Olana was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 14, 1966.
What type of historic resource is Olana?
Olana is classified as a building in the National Register of Historic Places.
Is Olana a National Historic Landmark?
Yes. Olana has been designated a National Historic Landmark (NHL), the highest level of federal recognition for historic properties in the United States.
What is the period of significance for Olana?
The period of significance for Olana is recorded as the industrial era.
Can I research the history near Olana?
Yes. Aubrey Research reports search National Register listings, battlefield records, land patents, and other primary historical sources within any radius of a US address. A report for an address near Olana will include this listing and all other historical records in the area.
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