Tuesday, June 18, 2019

Architecture tourism: Best U.S. buildings, parks, and museums to visit this summer

You can scan social media and admire great architecture and design from afar, but there’s something to be said about seeing a great work in its natural environment. With summer travel season at its apex, there’s plenty of time to get site-specific with pilgrimages to architectural masterpieces or make time for urban innovations during your next long weekend out of town. We’ve assembled a list of some of our favorite tours, sites, and buildings for architecturally minded travelers to add to their itinerary, organized west to east and including new openings of note. We can’t cover it all, but this should be a good start.

1. Sea Ranch

A pioneering residential development along the northern coast of California, the Sea Ranch, which features the landscape designer Lawrence Halprin, architect Charles Moore, and graphic artist Barbara Stauffacher Solomon, among many others, was an attempt at a pastoral utopia for the middle-class Bay Area intellectual. The development of the original site—and the timber-clad, shed-roofed buildings nestled within it—have deeply influenced modernist design. Key trends, such as vernacular modernism that incorporates local materials and graphic interiors, can all be traced back to this singular project. Note that the development is still a private community; those wanting to visit can access public beaches and trails or rent a house there to take advantage (the Lodge at The Sea Ranch is also due to reopen in late 2019), but visiting renters should take care to respect the rights and privacy of current homeowners.

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2. Portland Building

1120 SW 5th Ave
Portland, OR 97204

Considered the first major work of postmodernism when it was completed in 1982 (not to be confused with earlier, example-setting buildings like the Vanna Venturi house), the Portland Municipal Services Building exemplified the style’s playful re-interpretations of classical design elements. Architect Michael Graves saw the project as a ”symbolic gesture” to reclaim design from Modernism’s staid, boxy, glass-and-steel grip. Wrapped in several colors and featuring bold design flourishes—including keystones, pilasters and belvederes—the 15-story building made a case for creativity in architecture. The debate still rages on: Is such a design choice engaging recontextualization, or whimsy light on symbolism? Currently, the building is in the process of a contentious $195 million “reskinning,” which city officials say will remove, strengthen, and replace the facade; preservationists feel many of the materials used in the replacement will compromise the form and facade of the building.

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3. Golden Gate Bridge

Golden Gate Bridge
San Francisco, CA

Even when it’s shrouded in the Bay Area fog, this 1.7-mile suspension bridge, arguably the most famous in the country, still attracts cyclists, crowds, and onlookers marveling at one of San Francisco’s most recognizable symbols. Learn more about this infrastructure marvel at Curbed San Francisco, then plan a visit.

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4. Hallidie Building

130 Sutter Street
San Francisco, CA 94104

It may seem a little short to be the forerunner of today’s skyscrapers, but when it was built in 1918, the Hallidie Building was the first of its kind with a glass facade. A recent multi-year restoration project restored a bit of the nearly century-old structure’s shine.

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5. SFMOMA

151 3rd St
San Francisco, CA 94103

According to Curbed San Francisco editor Brock Keeling, the long-anticipated expansion of one of the city’s signature cultural institutions has been both an “unabashed success” and “standout in the neighborhood.” Snøhetta’s 10-story contoured facade, an update on the classic Mario Botta building, was inspired by San Francisco’s characteristic fog and choppy Bay waters.

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6. Space Needle

Space Needle, 400 Broad St
Seattle, WA 98109

One of the symbols of Seattle, this space-age observation tower, built for the 1962 World’s Fair, just completed a $100 million renovation last fall. Visitors to the local icon, whose designers left a large footprint on Seattle architecture, will be able to check out a new 360-degree observation deck, complete with a glass floor and excellent views of Mt. Rainier.

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7. Gas Works Park

2101 N Northlake Way
Seattle, WA 98103

A revolutionary creative reuse project, and a “beautiful way to remember a toxic past,” this Seattle park, designed by architect Richard Haag, reimagined a coal gasification plant on the city’s waterfront as an active park and children’s play place. Landscaping and repurposing of different sections of the abandoned industrial facility have made this one of the more unique parts of the city’s landscape.

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8. Hearst Castle

750 Hearst Castle Rd
San Simeon, CA 93452

The inspiration for Xanadu in Orson Welles’s classic film Citizen Kane, William Randolph Hearst’s castle in San Simeon was built on family land where he would take camping trips as a child. Architect Julia Morgandesigned the ranch and hilltop estate based on the newspaper tycoon’s eclectic tastes, including Spanish themes. “La Cuesta Encantada” (“The Enchanted Hill”) became a sprawling enterprise, complete with the nation’s largest private zoo, a movie theater, the Neptune Pool (which contained the façade of a Roman temple Hearst imported from Europe) and a private power plant. A perfectionist, Hearst often ordered different sections to be redesigned and rebuilt; Morgan started pitching ideas in 1915, but the project still was incomplete by the time Hearst died in 1951.

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9. The Majestic Yosemite Hotel

1 Ahwahnee Drive
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK, CA 95389

One of the defining examples of “parkitecture,” the rustic style of design found throughout the National Park System, the Yosemite Hotel (formerly the Ahwahnee Hotel) has hosted generations of tourists. Designed by Gilbert Stanley Underwood in 1927, the building was made to match its surroundings, and reflects the natural splendor that makes Yosemite so compelling.

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10. Eames House

203 Chautauqua Blvd
Pacific Palisades, CA 90272

Anybody convinced that modern design means cold edges and a stark palette need only peek inside the exuberant home Ray and Charles Eamesdesigned for themselves in 1949. Commissioned as part of Art & Architecture magazine’s Case Study program and placed amid a eucalyptus grove in the Pacific Palisades, the prefab exterior, a Mondrian-like assembly of off-the-shelf parts—colorful panels, glass, and steel—conceals a playful and living room. The inspiring, oft-photographed space, an artful array of toys, tchotchkes, and furniture, embodies the couple’s imaginative and all-encompassing design philosophy.

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11. Sheats-Goldstein House

Sheats Goldstein Residence
Los Angeles, CA 90210

The LA County Museum of Art’s first-ever architecture acquisition, the Sheats-Goldstein House high in the hills of Beverly Crest, designed by John Lautner and owned and loved for decades James Goldstein, is one of the most spectacular houses in Los Angeles: triangular concrete jaws held open by walls of glass, and filled with transparent sinks, built-in leather furniture (including a bed), outdoor corridors with no rails, and windows that look into the pool.

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12. Schindler House

835 N Kings Rd
West Hollywood, CA 90069

A radical departure from architectural convention at the time it was built in 1922, R.M. Schindler’s experiment in shared space, separated by sliding glass panels, came from an unlikely inspiration: a vacation village at Yosemite National Park. The layout of those shared campsites gave Schindler the idea of creating a live-work space appropriate for two families, a pair of L-shaped apartments with two studios and a utility room apiece. While it may not look it from the road, the home’s then-unique blurring of interior and exterior created a precedent, Also known as the Schindler Chace House, since his friend Clyde Chace and his wife were the first family to share the home with Schindler (Richard Neutra was next), this unique building was a early Modernist classic.

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13. Stahl House

1635 Woods Dr
Los Angeles, CA 90069

Pierre Konig’s classic midcentury modern design for the Stahl family has become an icon of California cool, perhaps the most instantly recognizable of the Case Study homes that helped defined this era of modernist architecture. Tour spots for this hillside home are hard to come by, so make sure to reserve well ahead of time.

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14. Griffith Observatory

One of LA’s true gems, the Griffith Observatory boasts some of the best views in the city, from sunset panoramas and the excellent framing of the nearby Hollywood Sign to the celestial wonders found inside this astronomy center. The best part is, it’s still free.

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15. Frank Lloyd Wright Hollyhock House

4800 Hollywood Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90027

A ’20s masterpiece that may have set the tone for California modernism, Wright’s most famous California project was reopened to the public in 2015 year after a painstaking restoration; an entire year was spent just studying and mapping out the updates that needed to be made to the former home of an oil heiress.

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16. The Broad Museum

221 S Grand Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s design for this Los Angeles museum, a serrated, 120,000-square-foot home for contemporary art, adds to the collection of cultural institutions on Grand Avenue. Inside, the curvaceous interiors and broad galleries make for a “fascinating museum experience,” according to Curbed critic Alexandra Lange.

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17. The Gamble House

4 Westmoreland Pl
Pasadena, CA 91103

A lot of weighty associations are attached to this airy Pasadena home and its gabled roofs: it’s the finest surviving example of architectural duo Greene and Greene’s work, an exemplary California bungalow, and a high point of the Arts and Crafts movement. But its romantic silhouettes, Japanese influences, and exemplary woodwork also point to an early example of Southern California cool, a thoroughly modern attempt to create a building wedded to the climate (note the numerous sleeping porches). Commissioned by David Gamble, an heir to the Procter & Gamble fortune, and designed in 1908, the summer home has become one of L.A.’s most-loved residences.

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18. Chicano Park

Logan Av & I-5 Ramp
San Diego, CA 92113

On April 20, 1970, this recreation space became the site of a successful protest against a city plan to build a California Highway Patrol substation on land where the government promised to build a community park. It’s since become an important historic site for the Chicano Civil Rights Movement, a National Historic Landmark, and contains the Chicano Park Monumental Murals, a massive and multicolored collection of street art.

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19. Spiral Jetty

Built in 1970, Robert Smithson’s 1500-foot long curlicue of mud, salt crystals and rocks is considered an icon of land art and statement on the nature of entropy. The sculptor, who declared that museums were simply “mausoleums for art,” scouted out locations in Utah for this work, and settled on Rozel Point, in part due to its red hue and nearby industrial remnants. To construct the huge outcropping into the lake, he hired a local construction company to push 6,650 tons of material into the water. “That was the only thing I ever built that was to look at and had no purpose,” said the contractor in an interview. “It was made just to look nice.” Despite the size, it’s part of the small minority of projects in our Land Art map that’s actually finished.

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20. Arcosanti

13555 South Cross L Road
Mayer, AZ 86333

Summer is all about finding your own utopia, right? If you’re headed through Arizona, make a detour to this utopian eco-city started in the ’70s, a prototype-in-the-making for a more sustainable way of life.

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21. David & Gladys Wright House

5212 East Exeter Boulevard
Phoenix, AZ 85018

Designed for Frank Lloyd Wright’s son, this spiraling home in Phoenix has been called a precursor to his Guggenheim design, and an epitome of site-specific architecture in the desert. A non-profit foundation is set on preserving the home.

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22. Taliesin West

12621 N Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd
Scottsdale, AZ 85259

Originally designed and built in 1937 as a reflection of the desert landscape (petroglyphs discovered onsite formed a basis for a motif found throughout), Frank Lloyd Wright’s winter camp for the Taliesin Fellowship offers a striking model of his philosophy, and functions as the home of the foundation that protects his legacy. This was a workshop for Wright, both a center for instruction and a constantly evolving creation (after returning each summer, he would quickly circle the site, hammer in hand). In the midst of a large-scale restoration effort, this is one of the 10 Wright projects nominated for UNESCO World Heritage recognition, along with the original Taliesin in Spring Green, WIsconsin.

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23. Aspen Art Museum

637 East Hyman Avenue
Aspen, CO 81611

Shigeru Ban’s elegant, lattice-like structure became one of the country’s most talked about cultural institutions upon opening, though local reactions were mixed.

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24. Denver Art Museum

100 W 14th Ave Pkwy
Denver, CO 80204

A mysterious, Late Modernist fortress, this seven-story addition to the Denver Art Museum is the only building in the United States designed by Italian architect Gio Ponti. Castle-like and clad in glass tiles, the 24-sided slate gray structure is enigmatic, befitting a space of creative expression and contemplation. The architect said of his design, “Art is a treasure, and these thin but jealous walls defend it.” Last January, the museum broke ground on a $150 million renovation of the campus, timed to finish in 2021, the 50th anniversary of Ponti’s design.

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25. United States Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel

United States Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel
U.S. Air Force Academy, CO 80840

Master planned in the ‘50s by a Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill (SOM) team led by the then 34-year-old Walter Netsch, the legendary Air Force Academy outside of Colorado Springs, Colorado, has become a National Landmark, due to its sharp layout and striking Cadet Chapel, a transcendent religious building that looks like a fleet of jet straining towards the heavens. It’s a picture of streamlined steel, strength, and fearlessness, all set against the backdrop of the Rockies and an azure mountain sky. Be sure to visit before September 1, when planned repairs on the roof are set to begin.

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26. Judd Foundation

104 Highland St
Marfa, TX 79843

The Judd Foundation spaces in Marfa, Texas, may appear more museum than home, especially considering the numerous studios and architecture offices spread among the sprawling town centered on a former Army base turned art mecca (don’t forget the famous middle-of-nowhere Prada store courtesy Ballroom Marfa). But the private residence of Donald Judd, set inside La Mansana de Chinati, or The Block, a former Quartermaster Corps office turned city block-sized development, is an adobe walled-home complete with a garden and Judd-designed furniture. Set within the larger complex, which provides unheard-of space to artists, the home suggests not merely a sense of freedom and Southwestern flourishes. Taken as part of a larger vision, Judd’s home and studios represents a different model of art, creative practice, and large-scale installations.

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27. Klyde Warren Park

2012 Woodall Rodgers Freeway #403
Dallas, TX 75201

This award-winning parkland bridges different neighborhoods of downtown Dallas by virtue of a deck design set above the Woodall Rodgers Freeway.

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28. Dallas Pritzker District

2301 Flora Street
Dallas, TX 75201

It’s not an official landmark, but as this article pointed out, Dallas has the most acclaimed architecture per square mile of any major American city, if judged solely by Pritzker Medals: I.M. Pei (Meyerson Symphony Center), Rem Koolhaas (Wyly Theatre), Renzo Piano (Nasher Sculpture Center), Norman Foster (Winspear Opera House), Philip Johnson (Thanks-Giving Square) and Thom Mayne (Perot Museum of Nature and Science) are all represented. If you’re time-starved and looking to check a few names off the list, the Dallas arts district gives you bragging rights in just a few blocks.

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29. Fair Park Dallas

South Dallas/Fair Park
Dallas, TX

The rides within Dallas’s Fair Park have earned legendary status over the years. But perhaps the most striking creations within this famous fairground, outside of the increasingly elaborate deep fried treats, are the buildings themselves, Art Deco masterpieces first unveiled during the Texas Centennial Celebration of 1936. The park played host to the state’s massive centennial birthday party, then the biggest party in Texas history. Twenty-six of the original buildings built for that headline-generating celebration remain, making the Dallas landmark one of the largest collections of Art Deco architecture in the country.

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30. Price Tower

510 Dewey Ave
Bartlesville, OK 74003

Frank Lloyd Wright described his lone high-rise as “the tree that escaped the crowded forest,” an apt way to paint a picture of this asymmetrical beauty, comprising 19 stories of angular walls that look different from every angle. Based on a design for apartments in Manhattan the architect created in the ’20s, the basic idea was transplanted to Oklahoma when Harold Price, owner of a local oil and chemical concern, hired Wright to create his first skyscraper. Opened in 1956, the copper-clad tower dominates the skyline. Visitors can now stay in a hotel in the top half of the building.

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31. Menil Drawing Institute

1412 W Main St
Houston, TX 77006

The latest addition to the Menil Campus, an exceptional collection of art housed in a series of superb buildings, this new design by Johnston Marklee is worthy of the already high bar set by the work of other architects such as Philip Jhnson and Renzo Piano. The husband-wife team “have succeeded brilliantly,” argues Curbed critic Alexandra Lange, “taking Piano’s long lines, the bungalows’ peaked roofs, Johnson’s palm court, and creating a building that is simultaneously secretive and spectacular.”

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32. Saint John’s Abbey and University Church

2900 Abbey Plaza
Saint Joseph, MN 56374

This modernist church is rightfully praised for its bell tower, a raised plane of concrete and crucifix that looks like a stone sail. But architect Marcel Breuer made the interior of the building, illuminated in part by a honeycomb of hexagonal stained glass, just as noteworthy.

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33. Whitney Plantation

5099 LA-18
Edgard, LA 70049

While there certainly are grander, more opulent plantation homes across the South, it’s hard to imagine one that offers both architectural history and a true reckoning of what these buildings represented to those who toiled in the nearby fields. The centerpiece of the first museum in the United States dedicated to telling the story of slavery, the architecturally significant grand French Creole mansion on the grounds, seems meant to be glimpsed at from inside the recreated slave jail. The home sits amid a collection of slave cabins, artwork, and a granite memorial etched with the names of 107,000 slaves who were forcibly brought to the state before 1820. Since re-opening in 2014, this plantation has stood apart from other such buildings on River Road.

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34. Gateway Arch

100 Washington Ave
St. Louis, MO 63102

Eero Saarinen’s simple yet profound design for this stunning monument still inspires after decades, a stainless steel symbol of St. Louis and the American West that welcomes countless tourists and roadtrippers every summer. The 630-foot-tall catenary arch is still the world’s tallest. The recently-opened, 91-acre Gateway Arch National Park, featuring a renovated landscape, park, and museum, attempts to add more angles to the Arch experience.

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35. Piazza d’Italia

377 Poydras St
New Orleans, LA 70130

Considered a seminal example of postmodern landscape design, this joyful, earnest celebration of Italian design was conceived of as a tribute that rises far above Disney-style kitsch. Architect Charles Moore was tasked with creating public space that touted the achievements of the large Italian-American community in New Orleans. The resulting set piece is filled with colonnades, a clock tower, a minimalist Roman temple, and a public fountain in the shape of the Italian peninsula. Conceived of as a redevelopment project for the city’s Warehouse district, the space initially fell into disrepair after it opened to the public in 1978, but has since been preserved, in a recent series of renovations that wrapped last year.

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36. Jazz Houses: Where They Lived

1443 Frenchmen Street
New Orleans, LA 70116

The artistry of Big Easy jazz pioneers lives in smokey clubs and second lines across the city. But to see the building where they actually called home, a recently updated app from the Preservation Resource Center can help guide you to hundreds of locations, including the residences of Jelly Roll Morton and Buddy Bolden.

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37. Farnsworth House

14520 River Road
Plano, IL 60545

Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House was designed, in the words of the famous Modernist, to “bring nature, houses, and human beings together into a higher unity.” Sadly, nature has been getting a little too close to this landmark lately, as flooding of the Plano River has recently threatened the home, and preservationists have begun debating potential ways to relocate or preserve the structure. While nothing is happening immediately, it still may be a good idea to visit while its still in its original state.

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38. Mitchell Park Horticultural Conservatory

524 S Layton Blvd
Milwaukee, WI 53215

These glass-covered conoidal domes have served as Milwaukee’s own set of retro-futuristic greenhouses for decades, recreating both arid and tropical climes year-round for residents of the lakefront Midwestern city. While these giant bubbles, created by hometown architect Donald Grieb, may seem like they owe a great deal to Buckminster Fuller, they have a number of unique structural characteristics, including a cast-in-place concrete undercarriage. Gelb’s striking concept has become a massive maintenance headache, and was closed in 2016 for repairs. In 2018, it was named a National Treasure by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which should hopefully help secure more resources for repair.

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39. Milwaukee Art Museum

700 N Art Museum Dr
Milwaukee, WI 53202

One of the largest museums in the country, Milwaukee’s lakefront art museum is also a work of art in itself, thanks to the beautiful brise soleil of Santiago Calatrava’s design. The Spanish architect has riffed on these forms, shapes, and colors before, but he’s rarely achieved this kind of grace. Perfectly positioned on the Lake Michigan shore, it looks like a massive bird perched on the waterfront.

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40. Unity Temple

875 Lake St
Oak Park, IL 60301

A radical church done in reinforced concrete, considered by many to be one of the first modern buildings in the world, the Unity Temple boldly challenged and redefined ideas about religious architecture, and a recent renovation showcases the full beauty of Wright’s creation. Part of Wright’s bold approach was informed by the relatively small budget, which pushed him toward to more cost-effective choice of concrete, and a tight lot, which resulted in the cubic shape. But his artful use of space within the main sanctuary—arrayed with mathematical precision around rich wood, stained glass, and furniture of Wright’s own design—offers a perfectly proportioned place of repose and tranquility. A recently completed restoration only underscores this building’s incredible design.

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41. The 606

North Damen Avenue & Bloomingdale Trail
Chicago, IL 60647

Those comparing Chicago’s 606 park to New York’s Highline perhaps have it half right; an abandoned elevated rail track turned showcase park, it does offer a new view of the city. But by adding cycling access and threading together a string of vibrant neighborhoods on the city’s new northwest side, the 606 does an even better of altering the way residents get around.

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42. James R. Thompson Center

100 W Randolph St #4-300
Chicago, IL 60601

If you’re taking in Chicago and its wealth of magnificent architecture this summer, don’t overlook this postmodern gem, which may not be around next time you visit. A towering pedestal of multicolored steel and tapered glass, the James R. Thompson Center takes up an entire downtown block, and could easily be mistaken for a retro-futuristic stadium from the 22nd century. The structure’s colossal atrium certainly doesn’t dispel that notion. Designed by Helmut Jahn, the ambitious structure, nicknamed “Starship Chicago,” was meant to embody a new vision for government offices and agencies when it opened in 1985. And while the building has its share of detractors—the former governor and namesake of the building called it “a scrap heap,” and current governor J.B. Pritzker’s plans to sell it are currently moving forward—it’s become a rallying cry for preservationists (one of the National Trust’s most endangered buildings), and a symbol of the fragility of Chicago’s rich postmodern architectural heritage.

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43. 360Chicago John Hancock Observatory

875 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60611

A signature part of Chicago’s skyline, the Skidmore, Owings & Merrill-designed John Hancock Center provides some of the best views of the city. While it officially changed its name to 875 North Michigan Avenue while owners await a new deal for naming rights, it’s doubtful Chicagoans will give up the original title anytime soon. Perpetually locked in a panoramic arms race with the Willis Tower, the city’s tallest structure, the Hancock upgraded its 94th-floor observatory, now called 360 Chicago, with stadium benches, and previously added TILT, a movable glass box that leans visitors over the city streets 1,000 feet below.

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44. Chicago Riverwalk and Architectural Boat Tours

E Upper Wacker Dr
Chicago, IL 60601

Visitors to Chicago often flock to the Lake, and for good reason; it’s one of the city’s greatest natural resources. But increasingly, the Chicago River is becoming a public space worth adding to your itinerary. A series of parks, concessions, and performance spaces installed along the river over the last few years has made it an engaging and enjoyable addition to downtown, a new waterfront gem that shows how urban public spaces are evolving. And, while Chicago Architecture River Cruise is a cliche, it’s a cliche for a reason; the entertaining and engaging tour, the ideal way to scope out the city’s incredible buildings, was named the country’s top tour by TripAdvisor.

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45. John J. Glessner House

1800 S Prairie Ave
Chicago, IL 60616

Sullivan, van der Rohe, Wright: All iconic designers who made Chicago an international center for architecture, and all admirers of this historic landmark in the city’s elite Prairie Avenue District. Architect Henry Hobson Richardson’s most notable creation and final work, a severe looking, castle-like structure finished in 1887, conceals a revolutionary layout. Recognizing that construction advances meant thinner, stronger walls and a new relationship between form and function, Richardson pushed exterior walls to the edge of the property and planted a vast private courtyard in the center of the lot, allowing for a private, light-filled urban residence. The home became a prototype of urban design, signifying a decidedly modern shift in building layouts, and conceals a magnificently appointed interior.

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46. Pullman National Monument

11141 South Cottage Grove Avenue
Chicago, IL 60628

A former factory town on the city’s far South Side, and an example of utopian thinking, corporate paternalism and central planning gone wrong, Pullman was designated a National Monument by President Obama. The late 19th century factory town, built by the owner of a luxury train car company on a 4,000 acre site, is an architectural oddity that played a pivotal role on labor and African-American history.

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47. Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument

1510 5th Ave N
Birmingham, AL 35203

From the A.G. Gaston Motel, a symbol of African-American entrepreneurship and a center of movement activity as well as the 16th Street Baptist Church, the tragic site of a KKK bombing in 1963 that outraged the nation, this collection of sites showcases Birmingham’s important place in history and pivotal role in the Civil Rights struggle, and grew out of the city’s own efforts to recognize its past and focus on preservation.

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48. The National Memorial for Peace and Justice

417 Caroline St
Montgomery, AL 36104

Located midway between the site of a historic slave market, and the river dock and train station where slaves arrived in Montgomery, Alabama, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, and its sibling institution, the Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration, present new memorials to African Americans’ experiences, as well as a powerful examination of America’s prolonged history of racial injustice. MASS Design Group, a Boston-based practice with a focus on social impact, designed the memorial, the first in the country dedicated to victims of lynching. Set within a Miesian box on a hillside, the somber building features 805 six-foot-tall monuments to lynching, each a piece of weathered steel representing one of the counties where a lynching took place. Hanging from the ceiling of the memorial, the markers offer cold, calculated reminders of the victims.

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49. Miller House

2764 Highland Way
Columbus, IN 47201

The work of many of the leading lights of Modernism come together at this glass-walled Midwestern home: architect Eero Saarinen, interior designer Alexander Gerard, landscape architect Dan Kiley, and owner, industrialist and philanthropist J. Irwin Miller, whose vision turned Columbus, Indiana, into an architectural “Athens of the Prairie.” The streamlined exterior and 10-acre lawn, featuring two rows of honey locust tree, just hints at the colorful, open interior, accents with Gerard’s playful patterns and an iconic sunken conversation pit.

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50. Columbus, Indiana

506 5th Street
Columbus, IN 47201

One of America’s unlikely centers of midcentury design is located far from the coasts, miles from any big city and squarely in the center of the Midwest. Columbus, Indiana, the beneficiary of the largesse and foresight of industrialist Irwin Miller and the Cummins Engine Company, now contains one of the most celebrated collections of modernist architecture in the world, featuring work by I. M. Pei, Cesar Pelli, Robert Venturi, Richard Meier, John Carl Warnecke, Harry Weese, and Eero Saarinen (whose North Christian Church is pictured below). In late August, Exhibit Columbus, a new citywide architecture showcase featuring new installations, returns for its second iteration.

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51. Alden B. Dow Home and Studio

315 Post Street
Midland, MI 48640

The son of the founder of Dow Chemical and briefly, a student of Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin, Alden B. Dow had the means and skills to create something unique. His home and studio, built in the late ’30s utilizing Unit Block construction, is a masterpiece of organic construction and syncs with the surrounding pond, garden and plum grove.

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52. Cranbrook Academy of Art

39221 Woodward Ave
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303

This bucolic campus outside Detroit not only boasts an impressive list of alumni who basically wrote the rules on midcentury American design (Saarinen, Eames, Knoll, and Bertoia all taught and/or attended), but a gorgeous campus designed by Elliel Saarinen that stands as a masterpiece of planning and integrating with the landscape.

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53. Fisher Building

Fisher Bldg, 3011 W Grand Blvd
Detroit, MI 48202

“They don’t make them like they used to” can seem trite, but in the case of this stunning Art Deco skyscraper, barely begins to describe the magnificent craftsmanship and design on display. This 30-story art object conceived by architect Albert Kahn and built in 1928 is still the world’s largest marble-clad structure. There’s a lot of exciting new things happening in Detroit, but this is a classic you can’t pass up.

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54. The Guardian Building

500 Griswold St
Detroit, MI 48226

Known as the Cathedral of Finance, this 1929 tower could also be called the Mountain of Masonry. Designed by Wirt C. Rowland for the Union Trust Company, the 40-story work of art features incredible interiors of carved pink granite, Mankato stone, Italian Travertine, and Numidian marble, as well as colorful pottery tiles featuring Aztec and Native American designs. The facade alone contains 1.8 million orange bricks, nicknamed “Guardian Bricks,” made exclusively for the Guardian.

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55. Packard Automotive Plant

Packard Automotive Plant, 6199 Concord Ave
Detroit, MI 48211

One of the largest redevelopment projects in the world started earlier this year in Detroit, and a new tour will be offered so visitors can learn more about the history and the future of the iconic site, as Curbed Detroit reports. The colossal Packard Plant—at one a symbol of the city’s automotive heritage, decades of disinvestment, and current wave of redevelopment—is undergoing Phase One of a long-term redevelopment of the massive site, bringing office space, food options, and gallery space to the eastside. Pure Detroit, who leads popular tours of the Guardian and Fisher Buildings, will partner with Arte Express on these new Saturday tours. While many have wandered the massive site on their own in the past, these tours will be more legit.

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56. Biltmore Estate

1 Lodge St
Asheville, NC 28803

At the largest private residence ever built in the United States, superlatives abound. George Washington Vanderbilt II spared no expense at his 125,000-acre estate in Asheville, North Carolina, which features the work of celebrated architect Richard Morris Hunt and landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted. Said to be modeled after three historic French chateaus in the Loire Valley, the sprawling estate may appear to be modeled after all of them, since the combined living space inside the numerous buildings totals 178,926 square feet (roughly four acres). To construct the home, a project which lasted from 1889 to 1896, a brick kiln and woodworking factory were built on site. The four-story home, divided into two wings, offers commanding views of the Blue Ridge Mountains as well as a vast collection of incredible statues, artwork and architectural eye candy, including a 70,000-gallon indoor pool, bowling alley, winter garden, 1,700-pound chandelier and a magnificent limestone staircase. Designated a national historic landmark in 1964, it’s currently a major tourist attraction and draws nearly a million visitors annually.

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57. Vizcaya

3251 S Miami Ave
Miami, FL 33129

Placed amid 180 acres of mangrove swamp and tropical forest, the “Hearst Castle of the East” is noteworthy for adapting Mediterranean and European architectural styles to the balmy Florida coast (the name references a northern Spanish province). French and Italian styles are reflected in the garden and façade, designed by Colombian Diego Suarez and F. Burrall Hoffman, respectively. Owner James Deering, who derived his fortune from being an executive at the family business, Deering McCormick-International Harvester, even created his own crest of sorts for the estate, a caravel, a type of Spanish ship. The home reportedly cost $26 million to build in 1916 and employed 1,000 workers.

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58. Faena District

3201 Collins Avenue
Miami Beach, FL 33140

The brainchild of a prominent Argentine developer, this $1 billion, six-block addition to the Miami cityscape offers a series of crisp, white structures imagined by some of the top names in architecture and design, including Foster + Partners and Rem Koolhaas. This new development adds another draw to a rapidly growing cultural and design capital, which also features a Buckminster Fuller dome in the middle of a new shopping center, a new Zaha Hadid tower, and a legacy of Art Deco greatness.

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59. Fallingwater

1491 Mill Run Rd
Mill Run, PA 15464

As Donald Hoffman notes in his book about this iconic home’s history, numerous streams run down the Appalachians throughout Western Pennsylvania, but Bear Run, the one ingeniously channeled through Frank Lloyd Wright’s magnificent Fallingwater, probably has the real claim to fame. The waterway’s steep drop on an elevated piece of woodland property owned by Edgar and Liliane Kaufmann, forms the dramatic nexus of Wright’s most famous example of organic architecture, a home of interlocking, cantilevered concrete terraces designed in 1935 and arranged so that a waterfall runs through it. This might be the most famous home on the list, but despite all the accolades, photos, and features, there’s still something remarkable about hearing rushing water in the middle of a living room.

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60. Polymath Park

2195, 187 Evergreen Ln
Acme, PA 15610

A Frank Lloyd Wright theme park in western Pennsylvania’s Laurel Highlands, near the architect’s famous Fallingwater, Polymath Park offers a more all-encompassing architectural experience. Visitors can not only see and tour the architect’s work, but spend a night in one of four homes either designed by the him or influenced by his work, including one house which recently opened after being transported from Minnesota and rebuilt on site.

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61. Buffalo, New York

3 Symphony Circle
Buffalo, NY 14201

It may seem unfair to single out an entire city, but as a feature by Alexandra Lange demonstrates, Buffalo is truly in a league of its own concerning late 19th and early 20th century architecture (including Kleinhans Music Hall, above). “Architecture serves as both a safety net and growth engine in Buffalo, which, thanks to a booming turn-of-the-last-century economy has one of the best collections of late-19th and 20th century architecture and urban fabric in the country. Louis Sullivan, Daniel Burnham, Frank Lloyd Wright, H.H. Richardson, and the Saarinens (both father and son) all did superlative work here before the second World War, as did native son Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in the midcentury.” A recent restoration of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Martin House just opened its doors.

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62. Monticello

931 Thomas Jefferson Pkwy
Charlottesville, VA 22902

No disrespect to the White House, but Thomas Jefferson’s “Little Mountain” offers a pinnacle of presidential architecture. The Piedmont villa, designed with Palladian principles in mind, was the statesman’s own creation, a fusion of classical elements, European style, and his own design solutions that served as the centerpiece of his large plantation. A restless thinker, Jefferson constantly tinkered with and redesigned his final home, adding personal touches such as an octagonal dome and vast library.

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63. Mount Vernon

3200 Mount Vernon Memorial Hwy
Mt Vernon, VA 22121

While it was actually named after an English military figure, Vice Admiral Edward Vernon, this eccentric example of period architecture is quintessentially American. Located less than 15 miles from the nation’s capital on a stretch of Fairfax County near the Potomac River, the plantation home of George Washington is a symbol of the gentleman planter, founding father, and slave owner, as well as his own lifelong interest in architecture. Washington oversaw numerous renovations of his home throughout his life—his idea for a two-story piazza was widely copied—and the resulting historic attraction is a grab bag of Palladian, Classical, and Colonial influences.

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64. Vietnam Veterans Memorial

The nation’s capital overflows with striking statues and photo-worthy memorials. But few offer as powerfully poetic a statement as Maya Lin’s famously minimalist masterpiece, a poignant list of names etched in black marble that near witness to the sacrifice of tens of thousands of Americans. Considered one of the country’s most famous works of architecture, the Memorial recieves more than 3 million visitors a year.

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65. National Museum of African American History and Culture

1400 Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20560

A new superstar attraction on the National Mall, this collaborative effort by Freelon Adjaye Bond/SmithGroupJJR boasts and incredible collection and amazing design, highlighted by the exterior corona made from 3,600 bronze-colored cast aluminum panels. Curbed architecture critic Alexandra Lange wrote that the view is stunning, “gold in the morning and glowing at night. The NMAAHC works like a power player who only speaks in a whisper.”

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66. National Gallery of Art East Building

Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565

One of the many masterpieces of the late modernist icon I.M Pei, the East Building, linked to the original National Gallery of Art building by an underground passageway, combines intimate gallery spaces with a soaring central atrium that’s home to a giant Alexander Calder sculpture. Finished in 1978, the building recently reopened after a $69 million renovation.

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67. Winterthur

5105 Kennett Pike
Wilmington, DE 19807

While it was funded by the fortunes of a chemical company, Winterthur stands as a paean to handcrafts and horticulture. Originally a modest 12-room Greek revival manor in the Brandywine Valley, Winterthur became the homestead of the Du Pont family, expanded over the decades as the family’s business and fortunes multiplied. Its most notable resident and renovator was Henry Francis du Pont, who took responsibility for the estate in 1914 and transformed it into a sprawling, 175-room center for his passions: art, agriculture, and American furniture and decorative arts. He collected so much, in fact, that he eventually turned Winterthur into a museum that opened to the public in 1951.

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68. Vanna Venturi House

8300 Millman St
Philadelphia, PA 19118

The Vanna Venturi House in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania, designed by Robert Venturi and partner Denist Scott Brown, was added to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places last fall, providing the 54-year-old house—which has been called “The First Postmodern Anything”—with its first preservation protection.

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69. George Nakashima House and Studio

1847 Aquetong Road
New Hope, PA 18938

Famed woodworker George Nakishima was declared a “national treasure” by the Japanese Emperor in 1983. His home and studio recently received a preservation grant from the Getty Foundation, underlining the importance of his legacy to American craft and design.

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70. Skyscraper Museum

39 Battery Pl
New York, NY 10280

Chicago may be the birthplace of the skyscraper, but its New York City where the building’s shape has been perfected. At the Skyscraper Museum’s SOM-designed home in Battery Park City, the skyscraper’s form and the forces that literally and metaphorically shaped it are explored. Admission runs just $5 for adults and $2.50 for students, a welcome break from the $20-plus admission charged at some of the city’s other fine institutions.

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71. Governors Island

Governors Island
New York, NY 11231

Governors Island isn’t the easiest place to get to—ferries depart from Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridge Park selectively—but it’s worth the extra effort. The former military base has been transformed into a 172-acre green oasis that hosts a myriad of events, artworks, and attractions that are often free. The Hills, an engineered landscape, provides a new scenic outlook and slides for visitors of all ages. Curbed New York has all the details about new events and attractions debuting this year.

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72. One World Trade Center

One World Trade Center, 285 Fulton Street
New York, NY 10007

Set inside three floors near the apex of the tallest building in the country, this observatory offers sight lines stretching 50 miles, providing a singular viewpoint of the island of Manhattan. Architecture fans should also make it a point to explore the neighborhood at ground level, since Lower Manhattan has become a starchitect draw, with a Calatrava-designed transport hub and other high-profile skyscrapers nearby.

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73. Whitney Museum of American Art

99 Gansevoort Street
New York, NY 10014

Renzo Piano’s home for modern American art has been one of the most talked-about buildings in recent years since opening to the public in 2015. With four levels and 50,000 square feet of gallery space, the internal space suggests a unique kind of urban stroll, according to Curbed’s architecture critic Alexandra Lange.

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74. Vessel

20 Hudson Yards
New York, NY 10001

A spectacle made for social media, this focal point for Manhattan’s new Hudson Yards mega-development, is both photogenic and polarizing, and a semi-public space still fighting for must-see status among New York City’s great walkable meeting spots. Visitors planning to climb the Escher-esque stairways need to register for free tickets ahead of time (check Curbed New York for all the details).

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75. Empire State Building

Empire State Building
New York, NY 10001

New, taller buildings may add to the city’s skyline, but this 102-story Art Deco tower is still the first thing many think of when they picture a New York skyscraper. The views from the observation decks are stunning; Curbed New York has a guide to getting the most out of your visit.

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76. Ford Foundation Building

Ford Foundation Building, 320 E 43rd St
New York, NY 10017

This Late Modern landmark of Midtown Manhattan, designed by Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo Associates and landscaped by Dan Kiley, created the gold standard for corporate architecture way back in 1967. The Ford Foundation’s home, updated in 2018, beckons visitors with its 160-foot-tall atrium, encased by walls of glass, granite, and Cor-Ten steel.

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77. Met Breuer

945 Madison Ave
New York, NY 10021

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s home for contemporary art, the former space of the Whitney Museum, showcases a daring design by Marcel Breuer, restoring the Brutalist landmark, and the architect’s intended patinas, to pristine condition. It’s a great spot for falling in love with concrete architecture all over again.

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78. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

1071 5th Ave
New York, NY 10128

Opened six months after Frank Lloyd Wright died in 1959, the Guggenheim met with the kind of criticisms that one might imagine the architect would delight in hearing: this incredible building was so striking, it would overshadow the art within. The apex of Wright’s cylindrical and circular style, this cultural center, a ribbon of concrete on the Upper East Side, descended from an earlier design for the Gordon Strong Automobile Objective and Planetarium. The open atrium and curved, spiraling floorplan created a unique viewing experience, with patrons slowly ascending towards the top of the architectural nautilus shell.

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79. Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum

2 East 91st Street
New York, NY 10128

A team of 13 architectural firms collaborated on a massive, $91 million overhaul of the former Carnegie Mansion-turned-design mecca, and the effort shows. The Gilded Age beauty, updated for the digital age, hasn’t lost any of its charm, and features in-depth examinations of design across all mediums, including a new exhibit looking at the influence of nature and sustainable practices.

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80. Manitoga

584 New York 9D
Garrison, NY 10524

Prolific industrial designer Russel Wright lived and worked at this stylish home in the Hudson Valley, a Japanese-inspired structure set amid the grounds of a former granite quarry, for decades. The manicured grounds and prolific material experiments inside the home, which, with its horizontal profile and green roof, seem to rise out of the ground, contains endless discoveries and an anthology of Wright’s concepts and ideas.

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81. Courtyard at MoMA PS1

22-25 Jackson Avenue
Long Island City, NY 11101

The annual build-out in MoMA PS1’s courtyard, part of the acclaimed Young Architects Program, provides a playground for daring leaps in architectural theory and practice. This year’s edition, an immersive junglescape by Pedro & Juana set within a large-scale cyclorama, goes up at the end of June.

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82. Weeksville Heritage Center

158 Buffalo Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11213

Built on the site of one of the first free black settlements in the country, this relatively new complex by Caples Jefferson Architects balances history and contemporary vision, a low-slung, streamlined structure in constant dialogue with cultural references. A recent and successful crowdfunding campaign helped ensure the institution’s future.

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83. Villa Lewaro

N Broadway
Greenburgh, NY

The grand Villa Lewaro, a 34-room, Neo-Palladian mansion in Irvington, stands near show houses inscribed with names such as Rockefeller and Gould, and has all the trappings of success, including a Louis XVI chamber suite, an Estey organ, and Rodin sculpture. But this home, and its first owner, represent something much more than mere wealth and privilege. Villa Lewaro was once home to Madam C.J. Walker, the country’s first African-American female millionaire, a renowned businesswoman and philanthropist who built an empire and became a key benefactor to the African-American community in both New York and across the country. After decades of restoration work, the 28,000-square-foot property now better tells the story of this pioneering entrepreneur, and the work of architect Vertner Tandy.

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84. Lyndhurst

635 S Broadway
Tarrytown, NY 10591

A towering stone castle built along the Hudson River, this limestone manse and country house once owned by robber baron Jay Gould exudes a romantic character, owing in part to its asymmetrical design and steep, Medieval roof, ornamented with rows of crenellations and turrets. Originally designed by Alexander Jackson Davis in 1838, the home was expanded over the decades, eventually given a striking garden with rolling hills and a steel-framed conservatory. Filled with English accents and Tiffany windows, it’s one of the finest examples of Gothic Revival in the country.

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85. Sagamore Hill National Historic Site

20 Sagamore Hill Rd
Oyster Bay, NY 11771

A refuge for the popular leader that helped him reconnect with his childhood and when needed, avoid the glare of the media, Theodore Roosevelt’s Long Island home reopened its doors to the public after undergoing an extensive restoration project overseen by the National Park Service. While it’s impossible to appreciate the man’s love for the only place he ever owned, the detailed renovation has given the public an opportunity to see the sprawling family home in pristine condition, one that reflects the gregarious leader and his eclectic life.

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86. Philip Johnson’s Glass House

199 Elm St
New Canaan, CT 06840

An iconic work by a modern master, this home became a model copied across the world. While it’s amazing in its own right, and the scene of tours and special performances all summer, don’t sleep on the other building on the property. The recently restored Sculpture Garden, the largest structure on the site, contains a tubular steel skeleton and roof, which creates a grid paper-pattern of shadows across the surface of the interior.

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87. Oheka Castle

135 W Gate Dr
Huntington, NY 11743

Considered an exemplar of Gilded Age excess—on pristine grounds designed by the Olmstead Brothers, owner Otto Kahn would hold annual Easter Egg hunts featuring gold eggs concealing thousand-dollar bills—this is a truly Gatsbyesque manse on Long Island’s Gold Coast, situated on the highest point overlooking Cold Spring Harbor. Kahn, a wealthy financier, commissioned the duo of Delano and Aldrich to build this steel-and-concrete estate after his previous home was ruined in a fire. They responded with a 137-room paean to European architecture, a summer home that would have cost roughly $110 million in today’s money. Falling into disrepair after Kahn’s death, Oheka has cycled through a number of owners and failed renovations, and now operates as an historic hotel.

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88. Clark Art Institute

225 South Street
Williamstown, MA 01267

A sterling example of a subtle renovation and addition elevating an entire building, this multi-year project shows architect Tadao Andodemonstrating artful restraint. The 75,000-square-foot addition to the galleries, as well as thoughtful landscaping by Gary Hilderbrand, brought a new sense of serenity to this already bucolic site.

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89. MASS MoCA

1040 Mass MoCA Way
North Adams, MA 01247

Located in North Adams, an old mill town in the Berkshires region of Western Massachusetts, MASS MoCA doubled its exhibition space with a long-awaited expansion that opened in 2017.

The now-complete Building 6 is a game-changer in terms of square footage alone: three floors, an acre each, roomy enough to hold multiple site-specific James Turrell installations, say, or a 15-ton marble carving by Louise Bourgeois. Jason Forney of Bruner/Cott Associates, the renovation architect—who helped redesign the mammoth former factory space—described the finished product as more landscape than building. The addition gives the museum more exhibition space than any venue in the country.

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90. Yale Center for British Art

1080 Chapel St
New Haven, CT 06510

After eight years of planning and a 16-month closure for renovations, the four-story museum masterpiece reopened to the public once again in 2016, giving patrons and visitors a new appreciation for a Louis Kahn classic regarded as one of his best works, and a model for museum architecture and design.

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91. Gropius House

68 Baker Bridge Rd
Lincoln, MA 01773

Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius put his principles to practice when designing this home for his family in 1938, after he was offered a teaching post at Harvard. The German architect simply considered it his take on regional design, complete with a brick and clapboad facade. But, of course, one of the first International Style homes in the United States was far from what you’d expect from a standard New England neighbor (one of whom referred to the influential design as a “chicken coop”). The home’s stark, white exterior and unique material composition, including glass block and chrome banisters, offered a radical blend of the old and new, turning a post and beam frame home into a modernist statement. Designed in concert with Marcel Breuer, it is, according to Gropius student I. M. Pei, his teacher’s “definitive statement of domestic architecture.” Now a National Landmark, the home contains one of the largest collection of Bauhaus furniture outside of Europe.

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92. The Breakers

44 Ochre Point Ave
Newport, RI 02840

It’s revealing that when Cornelius Vanderbilt II set out to build a summer cottage in Rhode Island in 1885, he ended up commissioning a 70-room Italian Renaissance-style palazzo that stands as one of the grandest in a string of extravagant Newport Estates. The Vanderbilt summer home, designed by Richard Morris Hunt, stands as an exemplary Beaux Arts creation, featuring imported marble (including a blue marble fireplace), rare wood and a massive central hall. Hunt used the Renaissance palaces of Genoa as his model for the mansion, which contains a series of open-air terraces looking out at the ocean.

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93. Harvard Art Museums

Harvard University, 32 Quincy Street
Cambridge, MA 02138

One of Renzo Piano’s recent cultural projects concerned a selection of galleries and museums on the Harvard campus, a stylistic mashup that managed to restore the original ’20s structures while creating a modern, unified whole.

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94. Trinity Church

206 Clarendon St
Boston, MA 02116

One of architect Henry Hobson Richardson’s masterpieces, this house of worship has become an iconic example of his sturdy, striking style. It portrays a sense of massiveness through sheer size (90 million pounds of stone were used during construction) and by design, with a series of towers and rough stone walls covered in balanced, bold, ornamentation, such as the checkerboard band circling the chapel. The open interior, with murals and stained glass windows, is also a showstopper.

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95. Paul Weidlinger Home

54 Valley Road
Wellfleet, MA 02667

Normally, a summertime tour of the modernist homes on Cape Cod doesn’t need a new hook, but this year, the stunning 1953 cottage of this structural engineer adds a new reason to make the trip. Weidlinger was a contemporary and collaborator with Marcel Breuer, and this home, complete with steel bracing, showcase the skills and thought process of this pioneer, a Le Corbusier apprentice who was among the first to use computers in building design.

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