Hudson River Historic District - Aesthetics

Aesthetics

The estate houses generally followed the pattern established by Clermont — a house with a river and mountain view surrounded by "pleasure grounds", with an approach road from the east so as to reveal the vista only at the house. The farm leaseholds were usually located further inland. This accounts for the large areas of open space still apparent in the district today.

The tenant farms also boasted distinct architecture, mostly vernacular styles. Most notable among them would have been the wooden, center-aisled New World Dutch barn, often built before the farmhouse. In the pre-industrial era, it could store all the animals and equipment necessary for growing and harvesting wheat, the region's primary cash crop, as well as the harvest itself. Several remain standing.

Farmhouses were, in the colonial era, often small two-story structures. It was not uncommon for them to be razed if the landlord desired to extend the estate to the farm property and move the tenants further east; as a result most of the surviving ones are made out of stone, such as Clermont's Stone Jug and Rhinebeck's Fredenburg House, since they were harder to demolish. Later in the 18th century, after independence, the tenants' homes echoed the Neoclassical aspirations of their landlords, as well as similar trends in Germany. Around Clermont, some two-story wood-frame farmhouses with five-bay facades and centrally-located entrances remain from this period.

The advent of Romanticism began to show in the farmhouses around the mid-19th century, shortly after its debut in the estates. Like their neoclassical predecessors, they took as much inspiration from popular German forms as from the landowners' homes. The farmhouses built during this period are large, square, hipped-roof structures with ponderous cornices and large porches to match. While there are no houses in this style left in the district, some older barns and other farm buildings show it.

Church stylings gradually show some difference between those where the landlords worshipped and their tenant counterparts. Early churches hosted both, with the oldest example in the district being the plain white frame Red Church along Route 9G in Red Hook, dating to the early years of the 19th century. Later on, the wealthy began building churches and chapels for their private or exclusive use, and these, such as the chapel on the Clarkson property on 9G, show more ornament than the older churches.

The hamlets, particularly Rhinecliff and Tivoli, also reflect the area's original land distributions. Many of their houses are small two-story frame structures in Victorian styles that occupy small lots on narrow streets. Commercial buildings, in the core neighborhoods, usually occupy the ground floors of such houses or small brick buildings. The landowners often donated money for various public buildings like churches and schools, such as Rhinecliff's Morton Memorial Library.