Old Lyme CT Historic Homes: Florence Griswold House

The Florence Griswold House was a boarding house which at the turn of the 20th Century, became the center of the American Impressionist art movement where great artists lived and painted - sometimes on the house's walls and doors in lieu of rent. Among the leading artists of the Lyme Art Colony who resided here were Henry Ward Ranger, Childe Hassam, Edward Charles Volkert, and Willard Metcalf. The wife of President Woodrow Wilson at one point boarded here and the President visited and dined with "Miss Florence" and the house's bohemian artists.

The Florence Griswold House which has played such an important part in the history of American art was built in 1817 for William Noyes. The Georgian-style mansion was designed by Samuel Blecher who was also the architect of the Old Lyme's First Congregational Church. In 1841, the twelve-acre estate was purchased by Captain Robert Griswold, a successful sea captain at the time of his marriage to Helen Powers.

Miss Florence Ann Griswold was born on Christmas Day, 1850 while her father was on a voyage to London. She was one of four children of the Griswold family growing up in the finest house on the main street of Old Lyme - a family that had been among the earliest founders of the community going back to the early 1600's.

Old Lyme had been a center of shipbuilding and commerce between the late-18th Century and mid-19th Century when over 200 sailing vessels were built and launched from its shipyards at the mouths of the Lieutenant and Connecticut Rivers. By the latter half of the 19th Century however, steamships had replaced the sailing ships Old Lyme's shipyards built and the community went into economic decline.

Beginning in 1878, Florence together with her mother and sisters opened the Griswold Home School for girls offering lessons in painting, drawing and music which they operated for 14 years. However, in 1882 her father died leaving the family and his unmarried daughter "Miss Florence" in a difficult financial situation. The family began taking on occasional seasonal boarders, giving piano lessons and selling vegetables from their garden to make ends meet.

Her sister Louise who was the family musician died in a carriage accident in 1896, her mother Helen passed away in 1899, leaving Florence in charge of maintaining the home after her sister Adele was committed to a mental hospital. At 49, Florence was left with little more than her family property and possessions to her name.

In 1899 a very fortuitous meeting took place between Florence and the prominent landscape artist Henry Ward Ranger that would transform the Old Lyme sea captain's house into one of the largest and most significant art colonies in America. Ranger had just returned from traveling and studying in Europe, and wanted to create an art colony in America modeled on the French Barbizon.

He was completely taken by the "gorgeous" countryside "where pictures are made," and the gracious hospitality of "Miss Florence" and her boarding house. He proposed the idea to her that he felt it would be the perfect country local to establish an American school of landscape painting - and it wasn't long before the house was filled with artists.

Located on the seacoast between the cultural hubs of New York and Boston, Ranger established a new American "tonal" school of landscape painting. Miss Florence's education had been primarily in the arts, and her wealthy father's sea captain's house was filled with beautiful acquisitions he had acquired during his voyages overseas that gave the residence a special character.

Her gracious hospitality, cheerful optimism and inexpensive lodging provided the artists a nurturing environment to develop their craft in what for a time came to be known as the "American Barbizon." Many famous artists came to stay at the boarding house making it one of the most important art colonies in America. After Childe Hassam arrived in 1903, the colony's artistic focus started to shift from Tonalism to Impressionism.

Willard Metcalf, Walter Griffin, Allen Talcott, Will Howe Foote, Frank DuMond, Matilda Browne, William Chadwick and many others important American artists built their reputations with their Old Lyme paintings that would serve as beacons to artists coming to town for decades.

Many of the artists who stayed at the Florence Griswold House painted directly on the walls and doors following a tradition probably begun in the French art colonies like Barbizon. Forty-one of these types of paintings appear throughout the house, with the dining room having the most stunning examples that makes the Florence Griswold House in Old Lyme a living chronicle of the most noted names in American Impressionism. Artists whose paintings now command top dollars painted on the walls when they couldn't afford rent.

Today you can see these paintings and many more by visiting the Florence Griswold Museum at 96 Lyme Street Old Lyme, CT. Next door is the Lyme Art Association Gallery that was America's first gallery in 1921 built by a summer art colony. The Florence Griswald House was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1993 making it one of Old Lyme Connecticut's most important historic homes.

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