The Glass House: An Architect’s Playground
I woke up early to catch the 8 am train from Grand Central to New Canaan, Connecticut and joined the 10 am tour. Just enough time to get a quick breakfast on the main street.
New Canaan was a welcome change from the city. The abundant shade provided refuge from the blistering summer. The Glass House check-in center was only a brisk 5-minute walk from the station where a shuttle awaited visitors.
The estate consists of 6 indoor buildings, 2 outdoor pavilions, 1 monolithic monument, and a few other playful landscape elements like Donald Judd’s first topographic concrete sculpture and a swimming pool that’s shaped like a disk.
Each place has a dedicated function:
The Glass House for living and entertaining
The Brick House for guests
The Studio for working and resource
The Painting Gallery and Sculpture Gallery for Johnson’s personal art collections
The Pavilion in Pond, The Ghost House, and “The Monument to Lincoln Kristen” for contemplating
On a deeper level, the Glass House engages a conversation about what we long from our lives: the balance between leisure and productivity.
When visitors first step into the Glass House they are asked to redefine what boundaries are meaningful for them and what’s possible when you have no economic restrictions (privacy is possible when you build a 1895 sq ft home in the middle of a 47-acre property).
The Glass House is controversial for practical reasons. However, its not-so-minimalist focus has something to teach everyone. The architecture tells us to be deliberate with our actions and interactions - never associate eating with working, nor entertaining with contemplating.
The irony of implementing restrictions is that it actually frees us from our conflicting intentions.
My cousin, who tagged along with me, happened to be in the middle of an apartment move in the city. The visit provided him a deeper perception on space, intention, and simplicity. Whether you’re an enthusiast like myself, or someone who’s just willing to give it a chance like my cousin, I recommend visiting the Glass House for yourself.
You might love it or you might find it incredibly pretentious, but it’s undeniably a beautiful case for architecture as art.
