CCMHT Winter Update, 2026:
An arial image of Breuer by photographer Thomas Hoeffgen
A Breuer-themed sweep through Connecticut:
CCMHT Founding Director, Peter McMahon
Last week I took and swing through Connecticut to catch up with some folks and see some inspiring buildings.
The Fred Olsen Sr, house (1953) by Tony Smith. View from the approach and site plan.
(courtesy of Tony Smith Foundation) Bottom right: a bedroom in the elevated wing.
My first stop was to visit Yale art professor, Marta Kuzma who’s been a friend since we met at the Docomomo conference in New Haven a couple of years ago. She has a lovely Acorn house in Guilford on a peninsula (and old granite quarry) that projects out into Long Island Sound. At the highest point of the quarry is the spectacular Fred Olsen Sr. House (1951–53) by designer/sculptor Tony Smith. Now owned by artist Rebecca Quaytman, the house is an aggregation of radical, disparate parts organized in a pentagonal master plan. It's the last house Smith did before abandoning architecture in favor of sculpture, where he had more control over the process and finished product. The public spaces are housed in a dramatic structure that twists in plan and expands in section with projecting beams that look inspired by Soviet Constructivism.Held up by tree trunks, the ‘flying cabin’ bedroom wing has a very Cape Modern vibe, with great art and furnishings throughout the complex. The Olsen house is one of my global top-five modern houses. Many thanks to Marta and Rebecca for their hospitality. While there we visited another great modern house from the 60s by Vincent Amore on the nearby rocky outcropping of Mulberry Point. The house is mostly glass and supported by four umbrella-like, steel columns. Sunset on the Sound seems to be a spectacle every evening.
The Gans house by Vincent Amore (1960s) in Guilford.
My next stop was the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation in Bethany, which I’ve been meaning to visit since I met the Chief Curator, Brenda Danilowitz, in Wellfleet years ago. The small group of building sits on a dirt road winding through 70 wooded acres, and contains the archive, houses for a residency, and a fire-proof, cement vault building holding many of the paintings, drawings, prints, and textiles produced by this hugely productive couple over a lifetime. Another building houses some of Josef’s original furniture produced at the Bauhaus and the original loom Anni brought from the Bauhaus and used later at Black Mountain. Brenda and her staff located an irreverent etching/ caricature that Breuer did of Josef in the early 1920s. I had been searching for this at the request of the Hungarian journalist, Tas Tobias, who is now deep into research on what may become a ground-breaking Breuer biography. Thanks to Brenda for her time and to CCMHT Board member, Tracy Neuman, for joining.
Albers Foundation Chief Curator, Brenda Danilowitz and I looking at an etching done by Breuer at the Bauhaus. Right: Three paintings on loan to CCMHT by Robert Jay Wolff.
Next stop was to visit potter Guy Wolff, and his family, in Bantam. Guy’s mother was Elizabeth Wollf, Connie Breuer’s sister, and his father was the painter Robert Jay Wolff. The couple’s ashes are interred by the granite slab in front of the Wellfleet Breuer House, along with Marcel and Connie, and Guy made the clay pots that hold them. Guy and his son visited the house last summer to check on the state of the monument, post-restoration. When he heard the house was being sold two years ago he was concerned that he might have to move his parent's ashes. Guy kindly provided three of his father's paintings to be hung in Wellfleet. The paintings, which are mostly abstractions of the sun setting over Slough or Long pond, will be for sale, with some proceeds going to CCMHT. Many thanks to Guy. I then drove up to Norfolk to visit with this year's Breuer House artist in residence, Tom Burr, and his partner Billy Dobbins on their farm. It’s a beautiful house and town, looking very picturesque in a fresh coat of snow.
Breuer’s Gagarin 1 (1957) in Lichfield.
My last stop was Lichfield, which has at least six houses and a high-school designed by Breuer. I met the current owner of the Gagarin 1 house at the Docomomo conference in Havana last year and he kindly let me visit. I believe this house is the biggest and most lavish Breuer House in the US, though the house does some clever things to look smaller. Built into a hill, the entry is on the second floor, so from the street the house looks like a modest one-story structure, and the mass is broken up by interior courtyards making it look like a number of lesser buildings. On the West facade the long field-stone walls conceal much of the volume and look like they may have always been there. Like a hermit-crab occupying a discarded shell, the house peaks out from behind the massive masonry. Gagarin 1 also has Breuer’s most sculptural fireplace: a sinuous, organic figure in bush-hammered concrete. Joining me was filmmaker Jake Gorst, who has two documentaries debuting later this month at Palm Springs Modernism Week. One of them, Curating Modernism, includes footage of the Breuer House before, during, and after our restoration. Since we are spending much of our time archiving the contents of the Breuer House, it’s great to see all the dedicated institutions and committed people doing the work to preserve important modern art and architecture in New England.
Many thanks for all the support and I hope to see you on the Cape this summer.
In Other News:
The Financial Times did a full page story of the Breuer restoration and CCMHT in late December. See the story here Breuer will be appearing in Architectural Digest US in April as well.
In memory of Aaron Olmstead, a generous donation was made towards maintenance of the Hatch House
A gift was given in memory of Aaron K. Olmstead by his husband, Patrick. Aaron, who would have celebrated his 50th birthday this year, passed awayunexpectedly from cancer in June 2025. The CCMHT properties held special significance for Aaron, who deeply appreciated the design and architecture of the houses—especially the Hatch House, which brought together his passion for the ocean and mid-century modern style. Aaron spent many summers at the House, finding immense happiness and comfort there; even during hospice, memories and images of the House provided him with solace. Fulfilling one of Aaron’s final wishes, this gift is intended to ensure that others may continue to enjoy and create lasting memories at Hatch. (Aaron's obituary can be found at http://tinyurl.com/AaronOlmstead)
Stay tuned for info on coming tours and events.
We hope to see you in summer 2026…………