Work at the Lanier Mansion included the winter kitchen, updating wallpaper and paint and restoring the room when the Laniers would have bathed. Staff photo by Phyllis McLaughlin
It’s been 20 years in the making, but the renovation and restoration of the east wing of the Lanier Mansion is now complete.
During an invitation-only reception Thursday night, about 100 guests were the first to tour the newly opened wing, along with the rest of the house, which is on West Second between Vine and Elm streets.
Cathy Ferree, president and CEO of Indiana Historic Sites, praised the final results of the project, which adds additional space for events.
“It took a lot of hard work and also shows where the real living happened” in the house, she said.
Site manager Jerry Riley agreed. “In the rest of the house, we’re showing how the Laniers lived. In here, we’re showing how the (servants) – who made it possible for them to live that way – lived.”
James F.D. Lanier, who helped establish the first major railroad in Indiana – which connected Madison and Indianapolis – built the home in 1844. The Greek Revival-style house was designed by architect Frank Costigan and includes Costigan’s signature circular staircase, which starts in the main hall on the first floor and spirals up to the third floor.
Lanier moved to New York City in 1851 to work at a bank he established there with Richard Winslow of Connecticut – Winslow, Lanier & Co.
Lanier’s son, Andrew, lived in the house until 1895. Lanier’s youngest son, Charles, donated the house to the Jefferson County Historical Society for use as a museum in 1917. Ownership was turned over to the state in 1925, which opened it as a public historic house museum and continues to operate the property.
Riley said structural and exterior work on the east wing started about 20 years ago. That phase cost about $300,000.
The interior renovation began three years ago and was completed for about $100,000.
“The house is, finally, totally restored,” he said.
On the first floor of the wing is the winter kitchen and the family’s informal dining room. A narrow staircase in the corner of that room leads up to a room where the Laniers would have bathed, and another room that would have been the servants’ quarters.
Link Ludington, director of historic preservation for Indiana Historic Sites, said all the paint colors used in the restoration are duplications of the original paint colors, which were determined by scientific analysis. The wallpaper in the informal dining room, and the floor coverings throughout, are representations of typical patterns of the time, he said.
“We know the walls in this room were papered and that there was carpet on the floor,” he said.
In the late 1840s, block patterns, like the rectangular gray-stone pattern chosen for the informal dining room, were popular in hallways and rooms with a lot of traffic, because those patterns were easy to patch when damaged.
“A lot of the choices we’ve made have been guided by referring to period paintings and documents,” he said.
Ludington said the furnishings and other items that decorate the rooms either were already in the house, in the Lanier collection elsewhere, or were lent to or acquired by the state.
Riley said about 10,000 to 11,000 people visit the Lanier Mansion each year for tours or to attend programs.
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