Philip Johnson's Alice Ball House May Soon Be Demolished in Fight Between Its Owner and Town of New Canaan

[Read more about the Alice Ball House and other modern houses on 'Modern,' our new blog, here.]

For those who care about such things, New Canaan is as renowned for its large number of mid-century modern houses as it is for allowing a large number of mid-century modern houses to be destroyed and replaced by mcmansions. At least three of the Harvard Five architects -- Marcel Breuer, Eliot Noyes and John Johansen -- have had houses they designed razed. And I'm not sure anyone knows for sure how many modern houses in all have been demolished in New Canaan. Estimates of the number of modern houses that remain range from roughly 70 to 90.

If work by Breuer, Noyes and Johansen have all been destroyed, that leaves only two of the Harvard Five left -- Landis Gores and Philip Johnson.

And Johnson may soon join them. Cristina Ross, the owner of the Alice Ball House, which Johnson designed, has applied to the Town of New Canaan for a demolition permit. This comes after an extensive renovation, completed earlier this year (see here). (11 a.m. update: I drove past the Alice Ball house this morning and saw a big sign in front with the word "Demolition" printed on it, presumably a public notice that the owner has applied for a demolition permit. Generally the local government requires such notices to be posted and requires the owner/applicant to do so. Interesting that whoever erected it waited until after the Modern House Day tour.)

In other words, if Cristina Ross, an architect and developer, gets her demolition permit and if she proceeds, she would become the first person to demolish a house designed by Philip Johnson. Likewise, the Town of New Canaan would for the first time authorize such a destruction.

New Canaan would then be doubly famous -- for being the home of Johnson's landmark Glass House and for being the home of the oversized monstrosity that will no doubt replace the Alice Ball House.



The Connecticut Post had a good story about the issue last month, here. You'll see that there's lots of baloney from Ross and the Town about the other being unreasonable. This includes the Town's wetlands commission, by the way, which refuses to give Ross a permit to extend a driveway on the property across a wetland. I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest the perhaps the wetlands commission is being a tad too intransigent. I've spent the last seven years of my life working on land preservation issues that usually involve wetlands protection. I know a lot about which wetlands are valuable and why, about how some wetlands are so valuable that nothing should be allowed to be built anywhere near them, and about how some wetlands don't have much value at all and can be encroached upon. I also know the Alice Ball House a bit (I've been in it once) and its property (I've been on it a couple of times and I drive past it regularly). If there's a wetland on that property worth saving to the extent that the Alice Ball House gets torn down, then I'm a modern architect.

The Alice Ball House has been on the market since early spring for about $3 million. Nine months does not seem like a lot of time for an expensive house to remain unsold. And you can easily see it -- its right on Oenoeke Ridge Road, near the intersection of Hemlock Hill Road (the Celanese House is two doors away).

If you're interested in buying it, give the William Raveis agency in New Canaan a buzz. In the meantime, Cristina Ross ought to back off and wait for a buyer. And the New Canaan wetlands comission out to think a bit more carefully about its mission.

New Canaan's Modern Houses and the National Register of Historic Places

[Read 'Modern,' our new blog about mid-century modern houses, here.]

The people who want to put New Canaan's modern houses on the National Register of Historic Places (which I wrote about last Friday) say they've already been in touch with more than 80 homeowners and that, so far, the reaction has been good.

The project seems to be a collaboration among the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism, the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation, the New Canaan Historical Society and the National Trust for Historic Preservation (which owns and operates Philip Johnson's Glass House). And there's an advisory committee of John Johansen, John Black Lee, Toshiko Mori, Theo Prudon and Robert A.M. Stern. (Johansen is the only survivor of the Harvard Five architects (Johnson, Breuer, Noyes and Gores were the others); John Black Lee designed a number of New Canaan moderns, including one of my favorites, on Chichester Road, which Toshiko Mori, the chair of the Department of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, re-did a few years back (Lee also supervised the construction of my in-laws' house in Pound Ridge, although he didn't design it); Stern is the dean of the Yale School of Architecture; I don't know who Theo Prudon is, although I probably should).

Here's the idea behind the project, from the Glass House website:

The knowledge gained from this project is not only intended to shed light on the individual importance of this community in its greater influence outside of CT, but it is intended to inform other Modernist communities across the United States that wish to embark on similar studies. The recognition of mid-century Modern homes and their role as an asset within real estate investment is growing, however the formal recognition of this architecture is still necessary for a proactive approach to preservation. The thematic National Register Nomination of a number of these homes will serve this purpose.

I haven't heard about any modern houses in New Canaan being razed lately, which not long ago was a huge problem. I'm sure there are still threats, and I think the town government itself still takes a hands-off attitude about it, as if tear-downs were merely a function of the free market when in fact, with all the zoning regulations in New Canaan and elsewhere, real estate and development are almost completely under government control and tear-downs could be regulated too if the town thought it important enough.

Listing on the National Register in itself won't prevent tear downs. But it will be one more way to put encourage owners to preserve modern houses and, with any luck, discourage the spec developers from buying them and tearing them down. I think it's a terrific and very ambitious idea.

Which prompts this thought: while the list is being prepared for the National Register, someone ought to come up with a complementary list of developers who buy and tear down modern houses. Maybe they'd be less willing to do it if we make their names known (like this guy, in Westport).