Upcoming Programs

For More Details on Program: Please click on photo.

Location: Lectures for 2024-25 will take place at the Bruce Museum, 1 Museum Drive, Greenwich, CT 06830 unless otherwise noted.
Reservations:  Guests are welcome. The guest fee is $30.00 payable by check in advance.  For reservations please email greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com.

Program Events
No Lecture
Rogue's Gallery
Feb 3
Rogue's Gallery

Philip Hook, Board Member and Senior Director of Impressionist & Modern art in Sotheby’s London

Philip Hook takes the lid off the world of art dealing to reveal the brilliance, cunning, greed and daring of its practitioners. In a richly anecdotal narrative he describes the rise and occasional fall of the extraordinary men and women who over the centuries have made it their business to sell art to kings, merchants, nobles, entrepreneurs and museums.

From its beginnings in Antwerp, where paintings were sometimes sold by weight, to the rich hauteur of the contemporary gallery in London, Paris and New York, art dealing has been about identifying what is intangible but infinitely desirable, and then finding clients for whom it is irresistible. Those who have purveyed art for a living range from tailors, spies and the occasional anarchist to scholars, aristocrats, merchants and connoisseurs, each variously motivated by greed, belief in their own vision of art and its history, or simply the will to win.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Lecture on Zoom

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Marjorie Merriweather Post’s Hillwood and the Vision from a Private Collection to Public Museum
Mar 3
Marjorie Merriweather Post’s Hillwood and the Vision from a Private Collection to Public Museum

Dr Rebecca Tilles, Senior Project Manager of Exhibitions at L'Ecole School of Jewelry Arts

Lecture on Zoom

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Marjorie Merriweather Post in her Icon Room at Tregaron, Washington, D.C., 1950

Verdura: The Image-Maker and His Women of Style
Apr 7
Verdura: The Image-Maker and His Women of Style

James Haag,
Managing Director, Verdura

Fulco di Verdura, a Sicilian Duke, will forever be associated with Coco Chanel, Cole Porter, Greta Garbo, Babe Paley, Tallulah Bankhead, and scores of legendary twentieth-century women who preferred style over status.

The presentation will trace Verdura’s design legacy from turn-of-the-century Sicily and 1920s Paris to 1930s Hollywood and the unfolding café society style revolution in 1940s and 1950s New York.

Verdura’s women of style will be profiled, as well as the enduring mark his work has left on modern fine jewelry design.

As a special treat, Jim will provide an intimate glimpse into Verdura’s role in the styling of the television show, Feud: Capote vs. The Swans, for which they loaned over 100 iconic pieces, including vintage jewelry owned by the original swans.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Picture:VINTAGE GOLD AND DIAMOND "FEATHER HEADDRESS" TIARA

VERDURA, 1957

Verdura Museum Collection

Yellow gold and platinum tiara designed as a feather headdress, composed of 36 leaves, half diamond with gold veins and have gold with diamond veins, set with 1,223 diamonds.

Women Dressing Women: A Lineage of Female Fashion Design
May 5
Women Dressing Women: A Lineage of Female Fashion Design

Mellissa Huber,  Associate Curator, The Costume Institute, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

This behind-the-scenes look at the recent Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition Women Dressing Women explores the considerable impact of fashion created by and for women tracing a historical and conceptual lineage across over one-hundred years of design. Women’s progress in fashion is charted through the critical premises of Anonymity, Visibility, Agency, and Absence/Omission, celebrating the work of well known, forgotten, and emerging designers alike—all drawn from the incredible permanent collection of The Costume Institute.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Picture: Melissa Huber

American and Decorative Fine Arts of the H. Richard Dietrich, Jr., Foundation
Jun 2
American and Decorative Fine Arts of the H. Richard Dietrich, Jr., Foundation

H. Richard Dietrich III, Director of the H. Richard Dietrich, Jr. Collection

H. Richard Dietrich III will discuss the upcoming Summer 2025 exhibition at the Lyman Allyn Museum of Art in New London, Connecticut, entitled China from China. The show features porcelain and stories from early U.S. trade with China, focussing on Connecticut connections and stories. 

The first version of this show was a widely popular exhibit in Washington, DC at the Chinese American Museum which ran from Spring of 2022 to winter of 2023. The show tells the story of America first meeting China through paintings, porcelain, and other artifacts. The humble beginnings of this trade grew into a key driver of economic growth in the United Staes, particularly in New England, and continues today, now the most important trading relationship the world has ever seen. The results of trade partnerships between American individuals and individuals within the Chinese system of commerce reverberated around the globe and through history, with opium as a complicated part of this story. 

Many of the objects in the show come from the Dietrich American Foundation. The foundation was established in 1963 and focuses on 18th century American fine and decorative art. The foundation works with museums and cultural institutions to support their collections primarily through loans of objects, with the Philadelphia Museum of Art as its closest partner. A 2020 book, entitled In Pursuit of History, describes this collection and history with essays exploring the formation of the collection and its many areas of strength, enhancing current understandings of colonial history and material culture. The book was published in association with the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and distributed by Yale Press.   

Richard Dietrich is on the board of the Dietrich American Foundation and lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland with his wife and two daughters.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Picture: H Richard Dietrich III

All lectures are the property of the speaker and may not be disseminated, shared, recorded or distributed, in print or digitally, without the lecturer's express written permission.  Your attendance at any Greenwich Decorative Arts lecture is not permission to disseminate, share, record or distribute.

Details of Past Programs for  the previous year can be found below.

Details of Past Programs for other years can be found by clicking on More and then History at the top of our site.

Past Programs

Featured
A Storied Past: Collections of Historic Odessa
Dec 2
A Storied Past: Collections of Historic Odessa

Philip D Zimmerman, Author, Museum and Decorative Arts Consultant

An interest in early American furniture--has been constant throughout my career.  My book on the furniture and other collections of two important houses (1771 and 1774) owned by the Historic Odessa Foundation in Odessa, Delaware.  Each house retains many original furnishings and was actively preserved at a very early date.  The resulting connections between objects and interpretive possibilities are extraordinary and have already spawned several smaller publications.  Other furniture topics, notably the work of William Savery of Philadelphia, occupy my time and energy.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

An American Renaissance, Beaux-Arts Architecture in New York City
Nov 4
An American Renaissance, Beaux-Arts Architecture in New York City

Philip Dodd, is an author and classically-trained architect who graduated from the Prince of Wales Institute of Architecture in London. His firm, Philip James Dodd Bespoke Residential Design LLC is now based in America with an office in Greenwich.

The Gilded Age, also referred to as the American Renaissance, is an era associated with unparalleled growth, technological advancement, prosperity, and cultural change. Spanning from the 1880s to the1930s it marks the first time that the titans of American finance and industry had more wealth than their European counterparts. As the center of this dynamic economy, New York City attracted immigrant workers and millionaires alike. It was not be enough for the self-appointed elite to just build their own grand chateaux’s and palazzo’s along Fifth Avenue, as collectively they dreamed of creating a new metropolis to rival the great cultural capitals of London, Paris and Rome. To fluent their newly acquired wealth they needed an architecture dripping in embellishment and historical reference. Enter the Beaux-Arts

For this special event hosted by The Greenwich Decorative Arts Society, Author Phillip James Dodd will discuss the five homes featured in his book – The Samuel Tilden Mansion (now The National Arts Club), the Joseph De Lamar Mansion (now the Polish Consulate), The Frick Collection, and the Otto Kahn and James Burdens (which now combine as the Convent of the Sacred Heart); as well as the patrons and architects that designed them; and collectively their influences on the television adaptation of The Gilded Age.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

How to Read European Decorative Arts
Oct 21
How to Read European Decorative Arts

Danielle Kisluk Grosheide,
Henry R. Kravis Curator, Dept. Of Sculpture and Decorative Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Based on the publication with the same name, the speaker will discuss a number of artworks currently on display at the Met spanning three centuries of creativity. Providing a peek into daily lives across Europe, the featured pieces include furniture, tableware, useful items, articles of personal adornment as well as objects meant for display. Each work, either a masterpiece by a renowned maker or a less familiar article by a talented amateur, has its own fascinating story to tell.

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30 (guest fees can be paid online please click here)
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Flower
French (Vincennes), mid-18th century
Soft-paste porcelain, 1-1/4 x 2-15/16 c 2-3/4 in.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art:
Bequest of Mrs. Charles Wrightsman, 2019
(2019.283.61)

American Woman of Style
Jun 3
American Woman of Style

Jessica Glasscock, Author, Historian, Researcher, Professor at Parsons School of Design

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Jacqueline Bouvier on her wedding day, with Jack Kennedy on the left slightly out of frame] [1953 Sept. 12]

Credit line: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Toni Frissell Photograph Collection, [reproduction number, LOT 15412]

Conservatories, Orangeries and Greenhouses: Historical Precedent, Modern Relevance
May 13
Conservatories, Orangeries and Greenhouses: Historical Precedent, Modern Relevance

Nancy Virts co-founder and Alan Stein, President and Director of Architecture Tanglewood Conservatories

Tanglewood Conservatories

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Maryland Silver
Apr 1
Maryland Silver

Mark Letzer, former President and CEO of the Maryland Center for History and Culture

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Cream Jug - Mark Letzer Family Collection

The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920's
Mar 4
The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920's

Stephen Harrison, Director and Chief Curator at the Munson Museum of Art in Utica, New York

Picture: US Rolls Royce

This lecture will be on zoom

“The Fascinating Life of Hearst Castle’s Architect Julia Morgan”
Feb 5
“The Fascinating Life of Hearst Castle’s Architect Julia Morgan”

Victoria Kastner, Author and Lecturer

This lecture will be on zoom.

Jewelry For America
Dec 4
Jewelry For America

Beth Wees, Curator Emerita, The American Wing, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Picture: Brooch, Marcus & Co., ca. 1906
(2016.107)
Photo courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Great River- Art and Society of the Connecticut Valley
Nov 6
The Great River- Art and Society of the Connecticut Valley

Willliam Hosley, Principal, Terra Firma Northeast - Cultural Resource Development Consultant

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $30
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Afternoon tea will be served after the lecture.

PIcture: Hatfield 10-31-2022, Morton House c1760 CRV door 2

To Catch a Glimpse: The Newport Life of Doris Duke
Oct 4
To Catch a Glimpse: The Newport Life of Doris Duke

Charles Burns is an Independent Curator and Newport Historian and a guest speaker at Sotheby’s Education in New York City.  

Please note lecture is in the morning followed by lunch. Invitations will be sent out over the Summer.
We expect this lecture to be fully subscribed so it will be for members only.

Photograph: Doris Duke by Cecil Beaton, circa 1933

Holistic Gallery Restorations at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Jun 5
Holistic Gallery Restorations at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Holly Salmon, John L. and Susan K. Gardner Director of Conservation, Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum

Holly Salmon
Images: Courtesy of the Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $25
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Frederic Church’s Olana: A Global Artist’s Environment
May 1
Frederic Church’s Olana: A Global Artist’s Environment

William Coleman, Director of Collections and Exhibitions, The Olana Partnership

Picture: Olana on the Hudson River
Images Courtesy of The Olana Partnership

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $25
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

Forbes Pigment Collection at Harvard
Apr 3
Forbes Pigment Collection at Harvard

Alison Cariens, Conservation Coordinator, Harvard Art Museums

Picture: Pigment samples in the Forbes Pigment Collection
Image Credits: Caitlin Cunningham Photography

Guests Welcome: Guest Fee $25
Reservations: Greenwichdecorativearts@gmail.com

The Lost Porcelain of WWII: Restitution and Ceramics
Mar 13
The Lost Porcelain of WWII: Restitution and Ceramics

Lucien Simmons, Vice Chairman; Restitution Department, Sotheby’s, New York

THIS LECTURE IS ON ZOOM ONLY. IT IS HELD IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE CONNECTICUT CERAMICS CIRCLE

PLEASE NOTE DATE: MONDAY MARCH 13TH AND TIME 2PM

GUESTS WELCOME: FREE

RESERVATIONS GREENWICH DECORATIVEARTS@GMAIL.COM

Picture: Meissen purple-ground cream pot, cover and stand, Circa 1730-35. Courtesy Southebys