As architects and designers we are especially adept at seeing deeply within walls left standing from the generations before us. In historic restoration we strive to recreate the spirit of a house, rather than a collection of frozen “period rooms.” Because no matter how grand a house may be, real humans will live and laugh and love within—and besides, no one wants to cook by candlelight, even in a perfect replica of a 19th century kitchen!
Please join the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art-Philadelphia for an illustrated lecture, discussion and tour of this “under construction,” to-be fabulously remade townhome with Barbara Eberlein, ASID, of Eberlein Design Consultants Ltd., and president of ICAA-Philadelphia.
Very often, restoration means delving into the mud to discover beauty in ruins and to create enduring buildings that use a classical vocabulary. How do we help clients understand the value of hidden details? Of crumbling ornaments and vanishing millwork? How do we find the clues, large and small, that reveal a building’s potential and enable us to create a home of lasting appeal?
Barbara Eberlein has searched for traces of grandeur along the Main Line, from the Horace Trumbauer-designed Ardrossan (the Villanova manor home that inspired The Philadelphia Story), to Center City townhouses and throughout the country. In faded ballrooms where silk draperies are reduced to shreds by sunlight, Eberlein finds even the tiniest clues of life lived well and fully. Emotional and physical images merge to form an ideal foundation to create perfection: a home of vigor, life and purpose that will last for future generations.
With an influential voice in today’s dynamic design community, Eberlein has built a national reputation for expertise in the restoration of significant historic structures of the 19th and early 20th centuries. She is a sought-after lecturer on classical architecture and design, equally respected for her scholarly mastery and boundless enthusiasm for the field. Formally educated in the classics, history and art, Eberlein approaches each interior with the knowledge that one day, it, too, will become a part of history. Her work incorporates advances in materials, design and technology.