The Vanderbilts and the Gilded Age: Architectural Aspirations. 1879-1901

The role the Vanderbilts played in the social life of New York City and of all the rural resorts and watering places to which the wealthy of that metropolis regularly retreated was at least comparable to that of the Medici in Florence. As patrons of the arts the Vanderbilts certainly had their lapses but what family including their Tuscan counterpart would not in amassing so gargantuan a pile? Edith Wharton their severest critic wrote that they were entrenched 'in a sort of Thermopylae of bad taste from which apparently no force on earth can dislodge them' but today art critics are becoming more aware of how many fine things were included in the Vanderbilt treasures. Perhaps their greatest fault in taste lay in their seeming inability to dispense with any of their artifacts even in their largest houses. Beauty can be lost even in a clutter of beauty. The whole is not necessarily greater than its parts. - Louis Auchincloss from the Introduction

Hardcover: 340 pages

Publisher: St Martins Press; 1st edition (May 1 1991)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0312059841

ISBN-13: 978-0312059842

Product Dimensions: 9 x 1 x 11.5 inches

Shipping Weight: 3.2 pounds