COUNTRY HOUSE CONFERENCE 2025
November 15, 2025
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Newport, Rhode Island
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An exploration of the history and preservation of the Rhode Island 'Country House'. From rural 17th century farms to grand seaside palaces.
This program is in partnership with host site Salve Regina University and sponsored by the Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation
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Lecture Programs​​​​
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"Golden" Before Gilded: 18th Century Rhode Island Country Houses and their Furnishings
Presented by MaryKate Smolenki, PhD candidate in American Studies at Boston University. Smolenski specializes in the history of American 18th century material culture. An exploration of emergence of 18th century Rhode Island country houses and
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Thick of the Whirl: Newport’s Coming of Age as a Summer Resort Colony
Presented by Leslie B. Jones, Director of Museum Affairs and Chief Curator at The Preservation Society of Newport County. Jones explores the emergence the “cottages,” built across the landscape beginning in the 1830s with a look at Newport Mansions Kingscote (1839) and Chateau-sur-Mer (1852). These once “country” estates and their period impact on Newport’s ascendency as the resort destination.
Bois Doré, building a Sustainable Future for a Jazz Age Newport Cottage
Presented by Anne Fairfax, AIA RIBA founder of Fairfax & Sammons Architects, PC. Fairfax an award winning architect and designer discuss the groundbreaking work she and her husband Richard Sammons have brought to reinvent the landscape of a Jazz Age summer mansion for a contemporary sustainable future.
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Designing the Great American Country House
Presented by Richard Sammons, AIA founder of Fairfax & Sammons Architects, PC. Sammons an award winning architect and designer along with his wife Anne Fairfax have been pivotal in keeping the legacy of classical architecture and the American country house alive into the 21st century. He will discuss some of their defining projects.
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Building Conservation in modern day Rhode Island
A look at contemporary conservation practices in Newport.
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Tour of Ochre Court, Wakehurst and Vineland
with Jeroen van den Hurk, Salve Regina University Coordinator, Noreen Stonor Drexel Cultural and Historic Preservation Program. ​
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Host Site
Salve Regina University is a private coeducation institution charted in 1934 by the Sisters of Mercy, the core of the campus is made up of Ochre Court and the associated outbuildings, commissioned in 1892 by New York real estate scion Ogden Goelet and designed by noted society architect Richard Morris Hunt in the châteauesque style. In addition to Ochre Court, the campus includes former summer cottages Vinland commissioned in 1882 by Catharine Lorillard Wolfe and designed by Peabody & Stearns and Wakehurst completed in 1888 for J.J. Van Alen and designed by C. E. Kempe and D. Newton.
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