I spent part of the holidays with my brother's family, near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. I knew I wanted to visit the Barnes Foundation, whose world-famous collection of Impressionist art used to be almost impossible to visit. Then my husband was perusing a guidebook to Pennsylvania, and came upon Fonthill, the home of Henry Mercer of Doylestown. After reading about Fonthill, I knew I had to visit.
Mercer began building his very eccentric home in 1908 from poured concrete, and decorated it with inlaid tile from his Moravian Pottery and Tileworks (the factory is on Fonthill's grounds). The Moravian Pottery was a major supplier of Arts & Crafts style tile, and it is still in operation. Mercer didn't believe in architects or levels, something that's pretty obvious when you tour the house. Although they don't let you take photos inside the house, I took some outside--and you can see them above. It was a fascinating place, and we would never have known about it if we hadn't looked in a travel guide.
The Barnes Foundation was interesting in a completely different way. There are more Renoirs at the Barnes than in all of France (if I'm remembering correctly). Dr. Barnes had his own ideas about art. The paintings are organized and labeled according to his own system (a bit like the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, if you've ever been there), and the paintings have no titles or dates on their labels. There's been quite a bit of controversy over how Barnes set up his museum, how it was run, its finances, etc. It's too much to go into here, but you can read more about it online at the New York Times.
So be sure to check our guidebooks before you travel. You never know what you might miss!
