Linden: H Estate design
What makes Linden a great estate? It was certainly not inevitable. We’ve all seen fortunes poured into estates—both old and new—with sumptuous, even important results, but without that rare and elusive pitch-perfect synthesis of elements.
Linden’s expansive 17,000 square foot house embodies all the luxury and splendor vast wealth could buy in 1915—including such delicacies as gendered entry hall powder rooms. The majestically proportioned public rooms of Linden contain exquisite and unerringly controlled detailing: fine paneling, leaded glass windows, coffered and ornamented ceilings, and elegant fireplaces. You expect each of the seven bedrooms to have a bath; you don’t expect the fireplaces and balconies and sleeping porches. And since the most important infrastructure component at that time was human, the estate provides extensive staff quarters and workplaces—including a staff wing, staff dining room, carriage barn with chauffeur’s apartment, greenhouses, and caretaker’s cottage.
The grounds, a highlight of the Parrish Art Museum’s “Landscape Pleasures” tour this summer, are the result of 75 years of dedication. Manicured lawns, cutting gardens, fruit orchards and an alée of mature copper beech fill out the 16.4 acres in the heart of Southampton’s estate area, and preserve one of the few large intact properties from a golden age of estate construction. The architect, Grosvenor Atterbury, also designed the American Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Creeks in East Hampton (now owned by Ronald Perelman) and Southampton’s Parrish Art Museum.
What, after all, produces that ineffable distinction at Linden that we call a great estate? The observable elements, of course: architecture, materials, detailing, siting, landscape, light, vistas—but, beyond this, you can’t be descriptive. You must experience the way these things come together, creating beauty, forming a sublime quality that is more than the sum of the buildings and land and environment.
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Vistas of Luxury
Only the roofline of the main house and the shapes of mature lindens, maple, beech, spruce and willow separate acres of flowing green lawn from the broad Southampton sky—a look achieved through generations of care. Boxwood, yew and privet surround the pool and terrace, on the left. With a southern exposure, the rear of the house is bathed in light.
Main Reading Room
With all the beauty in this library, you might find it difficult to concentrate on your book. Leaded glass windows in the bay are each topped with a pair of transoms. Roundels in the lower transom delicately interrupt the square-light pattern. Plaster fretwork adorns the ceiling, and walls are paneled with wood.
Variations on a Theme
Broad, expansive and serene, the main living room can handle large numbers of guests. The square lights of the leaded glass doors and windows and square lines in the wall paneling give way to rectangular panels at the fireplace and doors and then to long rectangles in the coffered ceiling, harmonious variations on a simple theme.
Graceful Greenhouses
Even more unusual than the huge jade plants is the mechanically perfect 75-year-old hardware in the greenhouses. With a hint of nineteenth century gothic, but a firm commitment to early twentieth century industrial design, the greenhouses, besides being totally functional, make a fascinating aesthetic statement.
Guest Privileges
They call it the blue guest bedroom, but you would only feel blue when you have to leave. The upper sashes in the windows are diamond paned, as is the door leading to a private sunporch, the perfect place to catch the breezes and take an afternoon nap. Come dusk, you might want to curl up in a chair in front of the fire or write a letter at the desk. From time to time you might be expected to come downstairs and see your hosts.
Comforts, Modest and Otherwise
For those entre-nous moments or when you only have twenty of so of your friends around and the large living room seems too commodious, you might retreat to the small living room. Pared down in size and adornments, the room has a lovely scale, with attention centered on a simple, straightforward and bold fireplace, and a deep, off-center window bay.