Close to Home
It seems somewhat daft to assert that each geographical enclave retains its own special vernacular. As a vanguard example, that everyone can both recognize and wager an opinion concerning the “soda” vs. “pop” debate, signifies the commonality of vernacular observations and moreover, makes their mention of little interest. Yet despite the bluntness of vernacular disparities, over the years I have been repeatedly struck and fascinated by the discrepancies in how different people, from different places, choose refer to the location of their homes. Take the dichotomy between the greater Philadelphia and NYC areas for example. An individual living 20-odd miles outside of Manhattan, if queried, would respond that he or she lives in Yonkers or Westchester, maybe straining to clarify their proximity to “The City” if an additional dab cachet was in order. Conversely, if the same question were asked of someone living a similar distance outside of Philadelphia, the response would unequivocally be “Philly,” though in truth, that person probably knew Philadelphia proper about as well as they knew Miami—ballpark and football stadium held in exception. And just to further highlight the discrepancies between locations, the responses of the NYC and Philadelphia crowds are distinct from the enigma of Boston’s geographical vernacular, where, apparently, every Bay Stater lives, “15 minutes outside of Boston.”
I took the time to highlight this point about geographical vernacular for two reasons. First, I would like to admit that I have erroneously, as it is seemingly compulsory for people sharing my geography, claimed both allegiance and tight proximity to Philadelphia. This has mostly been a fudge to effect expedience in conversation, but in the ACR context, where culture is the focus, the geographical slight of hand has also served to add some cultural cachet—wielding whatever cultural dynamism Philadelphia may possess to service my own image.
—My house in proximity to Philadelphia.
The truth of the matter is I live some distance from the urban churn of Center City, and like the 1953 home I inhabit; I enjoy an extraordinarily suburban lifestyle. While some aspects afforded by my location are positively delicious—for instance I can easily ride my bike off into either the bucolic hinterlands or the bustle of America’s 6th largest city and come home to cool off in a backyard swimming pool—the immediate area surrounding my abode is distinctly lacking in terms of culture. Largely, my neighbors are a homogenized crop of doctors or lawyers or financiers, and as a group they are generally disposed to tending their gardens or children on the weekends, while sporting the latest offering from Ralph Lauren or Vineyard Vines at whatever golf club to which they belong. Good people, rest assured, but far a cry from cultural juggernauts.
Bearing this relative dearth of cultural curiosities in mind, I was so pleased to discover that only 5 miles from my home (ironically, in the opposite direction of the city), stands the former studio and home (now a museum) of one of America’s most famous early 20th century artists.
—Escherick’s home & studio—note the intentionally bowed roofline.
Wharton Escherick, born in 1887, moved to Paoli Pennsylvania in 1913 after dropping out of the Pennsylvania School of Art only six weeks before graduation. Originally trained as a painter, in school Escherick only dabbled in three dimensions, and it wasn’t until 1920’s that Wharton turned his focus to woodworking after receiving rave reviews on the frames he began carving to accompany his paintings. Over the next 50 years, Escherick’s style evolved from etching-based, fundamentally ornamental roots, toward a curvilinear, sculptural sensibility that challenged the traditional conceptions of everyday objects like desks, staircases and couches. Escherick’s work did more than challenge the status quo however. In addition to being a radical departure from the contemporary tastes of the early 20th century, his work was similarly distant from the orthogonal precision of the modern & art deco movements—aesthetics that, as Cameron pointed out in an earlier post, still inspire rebellion from contemporary architects. Though the large majority of Escherick’s work was dominated by either organic curves or linear asymmetries, he shared the modernist penchant for efficiency. Subsequently, every nook and cranny of his functional work was designed with ease of use in mind. For example, clever pull-out lights were built into desks, cutting boards were designed to perfectly interface with ¾ of the kitchen sink for easy clean up, and heavy doors were counter weighted with equally heavy hanging sculptures to aid their opening and closing. All these factors combined make his curious little house and studio, portions of which are now nearly 100 years old, seem strikingly contemporary—reflecting both the functionality of modernism and our greening attitudes.
—The concrete “silo” is not painted, but rather the color was mixed in with the concrete durring the construction phase.
—The front door located on the rear of the house as Warton used to approach the studio, which he later converted into a home, by walking up from a farmhouse at the bottom of the hill. Thus, the front door is seemingly in the back.
While there are a number of specific objects that would do well at laying bare Escherick’s aesthetic proclivities, the home itself is perhaps the strongest exemplar of his style. Like Frank Lloyd Wright, Escherick similarly believed that homes should reference their contexts and subsequently blend neatly into their surroundings. As such, the Escherick home is set some 20 feet in elevation below the driveway, and is appointed with subtle details like a bowing roof line, twisting chimney and a slightly splayed footprint, all in an effort to avoid hard, straight lines which Escherick deemed out of step with nature. In combination, despite one wing of the home sporting a camouflage mix of autumn colors and another wearing a distressed blue inspired by a pair of blue jeans, the home manages to nestle modestly into the hillside.
—The lower left hand corner shows the subtly splayed footing. Translucent glass provided light to the lower level.
—A portion of the spiral staircase with his sculpture “Oblivion” in the background.
Inside, the home is pulled together by a spiral staircase—appointed with a Mammoth tusk from Alaska, which serves as railing—that delivers access to each of the various sections of the home. The lower floor is a living area, with one substantial section of floor intentionally removed to give visual connectivity between the basement and the living area. In some places, the ceiling height measured from the basement floor can be over 30 feet, which is necessary to hold some of Escherick’s larger works like Twisting Twins. Five or six stairs up from the living area the staircase forks; to the right the spiral continues up to the loft bedroom and to the left five more stairs on an opposite spiral ascend to the kitchen and dinning room level. Moreover, at this fork in the staircase, tucked away very subtlety on the left is a small nook holding rotary telephone, a Rolodex and a pad of paper. Cumulatively, the hand hewn appearance of the spiral stair case, it’s central location, the rich, organic style of décor, all tied to communicative function of the telephone, makes the staircase look and feel as though it were the spine of a living breathing structure—with all actions and communications flowing through it.
Like most museums, the docent Gestapo severely hampered my ability to capture photographs in doors, so for visual references to complement my paltry descriptions you’ll have to rely on these slightly disorienting 360 degree virtual tours:
Though I scrambled everywhere to find static imagery of his work online, I was surprised to see so little was available. Only a couple low-resolution shots of the aforementioned (and included) staircase and his permanent installation in the American Wing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art could be found. As such, I’ve included all the best stuff I could find, in addition to images I was able to capture of the exterior.
So, as far as the moral of the story goes, you never know what you’re going to find right under your nose, even when it’s sniffing a long way from the great urban fountains of culture. If any of you make it down to Philadelphia, don’t be afraid to venture off the urban path; we’ve got some good stuff out here in the woods.
posted by nelson.
