Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)

Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)

Alexander Jackson Davis

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This plan, which shows an unrealized design for round pavilions at the north end of the house, may have been drawn about 1870. According to architectural writers of the day, one of the great benefits of designing irregularly massed buildings was that they could be added to easily. Davis proved this at Lyndhurst, where he only slightly modified the original plan of Knoll (1838–42), and added all the rooms to the north of the original dining-room alcove in the 1860s.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)Lyndhurst for George Merritt, Tarrytown, New York (first floor plan)

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.