"Town & Country: The Architecture of James E. Ware & Sons" by Patrick D. Wing is the definitive monograph about the enigmatic 19th-Century New York architect James E. Ware [1846-1918] and his sons Franklin B. and Arthur Ware. It will broadly appeal to fans and scholars of architecture, the Gilded Age, urbanism, and the history of New York City, as well as aficionados of vintage photography and Victorian lore.
The Ware odyssey is inhabited by chateau-esque Fifth Avenue mansions, iconic luxury resort hotels, fantasy inspired country estates, arguably the city's first actual skyscraper, and indisputably the most opulent apartment lobby in all of New York City. Their journey is portrayed through multiple generations, with all of its attendant artistic triumphs, professional rivalries, and society scandals. Manifested in cooperation with the architects' descendents, the author's profoundly informed and enthralling narrative is lavishly illustrated with a wondrous array of blueprints, drawings, and fascinating archival materials. The author [descended from a Ware client for whom the architect designed half a dozen mansions] has enlivened his work with delightful and poignant vintage photographs of the architect and his charming family. Wing's book is an exceptional filling in of an almost unthinkably untold gap in architectural history. In the author's telling it becomes a captivatingly romantic true tale from the Gilded Age.
