Word: gardners
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...Gardner not only arranged every object in every room; each arrangement expresses her personality. A not-so-conservative New York heiress, she married into one of Boston's most conservative families in 1880. Gossip about her eccentric habits soon developed--in part, one suspects, because the more proper Boson matrons envied her beauty and growing group of admirers. Of course, Mrs. Gardner willingly provided eccentricities for gossip--for example after missing the train to a party, Mrs. Gardner hired a locomotive, climbed into its cabin with the engineer, and shocked the party by arriving in this high style...
Meanwhile, her reputation as a patron of the arts grew. Mrs. Gardner began to acquire paintings--and a coterie of artists. Whistler once inscribed a book to his friends Mrs. Gardner "whose appreciation of the work of Art is equalled only by her understanding of the artist...
When Mrs. Gardner began a formal collection, she approached the project with characteristic energy. Bernard Berenson, whom she had helped while he was an undergraduate at Harvard, supervised acquisitions--but Mrs. Gardner made many important decisions herself. Considering Venice her second home, she carefully planned the details of her own Venetian palace. She revised the architect's plans for the foundation. She supervised the workmen--who had been specially imported from Italy for the project. (In fact, the walls of the court are not really pink marble: Mrs. Gardner's attempt to correct the painters produced that effect...
...elaborate, opening of the museum reflected Mrs. Gardner's love of ceremony. No newsmen had been allowed in, so curiosity ran high. On New Year's Eve 1903, Mrs. Gardner finally welcomed a few friends into her mansion. They rose to greet her as she sat on a balcony above the court. Then there was a concert by members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra...
...Gardner died 21 years after this ceremony--but her cult has grown. The museum guards uphold it. Of course, they are so old that I suspect that Mrs. Gardner selected and stationed them as carefully as she planned the inanimate objects of the museum. When these guards speak of "her," Mrs. Gardner seems very alive...