The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art announced plans to build a 10,000 square-foot addition! The new space would house most of its holdings of objects and architectural elements from Laurelton Hall, Louis Comfort Tiffany’s Long Island, N.Y., country estate. It would also include additional office space and triple the size of the outside courtyard garden to 4,450 square feet. Work should begin late this year and be completed by the spring of 2010.
The Daffodil Terrace from Laurelton Hall, measuring 32 feet by 18 feet, will be the architectural focal point of the addition. The recently restored terrace, supported by eight marble columns topped with bouquets of glass daffodils, has never been on view in Winter Park.
Laurelton Hall, built between 1902 and 1905 on Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island, is thought to be Tiffany’s greatest work of art. The 84-room mansion was destroyed by fire in 1957. Surviving architectural elements and windows were salvaged by Hugh F. and Jeannette G. McKean are now part of the collections of the museum Jeannette McKean founded in Winter Park in 1942. This museum has always been and will continue to be a Winter Park treasure! The museum is just moments away by car from Thurston House, a Winter Park area bed & breakfast.