The Armstrong Kessler Mansion (formerly known as Armstrong House) is a nationally significant example of

Italian Renaissance Revival Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th-century Revivalism (architecture), architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival architecture, Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival ar ...

architectural style located in the

Savannah Historic District Savannah Historic District may refer to: *Savannah Historic District (Savannah, Georgia), a National Historic Landmark district in Georgia * Central of Georgia Railroad: Savannah Shops and Terminal Facilities, Savannah, Georgia, a historic district ...

. The structure was built between 1917 and 1919 for the home of Savannah magnate George Ferguson Armstrong (1868–1924). It was owned by the Armstrong family from 1919 to 1935. Afterward, the structure and grounds served as the campus of

Armstrong Junior College Armstrong may refer to: Places * Armstrong Creek (disambiguation), various places * Armstrong River (disambiguation), various rivers Antarctica * Armstrong Reef, Biscoe Islands Argentina * Armstrong, Santa Fe Australia * Armstrong, Victori ...

. Threatened with demolition, the Historic Savannah Foundation purchased the Armstrong House along with five other threatened historic buildings from the college for $235,000 in 1967. Once saved,

Historic Savannah Foundation Historic Savannah Foundation (HSF) is a preservation organization founded in 1955 and based in Savannah, Georgia Savannah ( ) is the oldest city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia and the county seat of Chatham County, Georg ...

sold the Mansion (and Hershel V. Jenkins Hall) at the exact purchase price to preservationist and antique dealer Jim Williams who restored it as his home. Eventually, both were sold to a major Savannah law firm as offices. The mansion was featured in ''The American Architect'' in 1919, and listed in ''A Field Guide to American Houses'' in 1984.

Location and site

The Armstrong Kessler Mansion is located in Savannah's National Historic Landmark District at 447

Bull Street Bull Street is a major street in Savannah, Georgia, United States. Named for Colonel William Bull (governor), William Bull (1683–1755), it runs from Bay Street (Savannah, Georgia), Bay Street in the north to Derenne Avenue (part of Georgia S ...

across Gaston Street from

Forsyth Park Forsyth Park (formerly known as the Military Parade Ground)''Charles Seton Henry Hardee's Recollections of old Savannah'', Martha Gallaudet Waring, ''The Georgia Historical Quarterly'', JSTOR (1929), p. 34 is a large city park that occupies in ...

. It is in Monterey Ward (the center of which is Monterey Square), one of twenty-four wards laid out in the form of James Oglethorpe's original town plan. Other notable structures on Bull Street in Monterey Ward are the Mercer House and Temple Mickve Israel. Six city lots were acquired to build the Armstrong mansion, and two existing houses were demolished to make room for the 26,000-square-foot structure. The entire site, including carriage house and grounds, is 0.5 acres.

Original design

The mansion was designed by the architect

Henrik Wallin Henrik Wallin (October 9, 1873 – January 28, 1936) was an architect active in Savannah, Georgia, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was born in Rodviken, Nordmaling, Sweden. In 1915, the architectural firm of Wallin and Young was di ...

in 1917 in an

style with interior elements of various established and experimental styles. The ten-bedroom home has nearly 26,000 square feet of living area. It is three stories over a full garden level with Granite balustraded terraces at each level. A broad hemicycle colonnade extending toward Bull Street offers a prospect of

. Other design features include a

porte-cochère A porte-cochère (; ; ; ) is a doorway to a building or courtyard, "often very grand," through which vehicles can enter from the street or a covered porch-like structure at a main or secondary entrance to a building through which originally a ...

that opens into a side garden, an

orangery An orangery or orangerie is a room or dedicated building, historically where orange and other fruit trees are protected during the winter, as a large form of greenhouse or conservatory. In the modern day an orangery could refer to either ...

loggia In architecture, a loggia ( , usually , ) is a covered exterior Long gallery, gallery or corridor, often on an upper level, sometimes on the ground level of a building. The corridor is open to the elements because its outer wall is only parti ...

, and sunporch. The exterior materials are granite and glazed brick. Bronze entry doors were fabricated by Bonachek of New York, with other doors in steel with bronze hardware. Windows were fabricated of steel and bronze by International Casement Company, now Hope Windows, which features the home in its promotional materials. The attached carriage house was also three stories, having two garage bays designed for automobiles with front and rear entrances from the street or from the alley (or “lane” as they are called in Savannah). Living quarters were between and above the garages. The street entrances thus approached the carriage house through the garden creating a circular drive, with one side passing through the porte-cochere. The landscape plan consisted of two formal yards on either side of a wide graduated approach to the front entrance, orchestrated to match the grandeur of the main hall. The effect in front carried through to the rear, where a second entrance under the porte-cochere faced a large rear garden. Front and rear grounds were enclosed with 200 feet of ornate iron fencing resembling that of

Buckingham Palace Buckingham Palace () is a royal official residence, residence in London, and the administrative headquarters of the monarch of the United Kingdom. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is often at the centre of state occasions and r ...

Interior design

The main hall was designed with Italian limestone claddings, ornate plaster ceilings, and cornices. Floor-length windows, cornices, panels, friezes, and details reflecting a range of styles are found throughout the interior. Rooms drew from various period styles, including Georgian,

Adamesque The Adam style (also called Adamesque or the Style of the Brothers Adam) is an 18th-century neoclassical style of interior design and architecture, as practised by Scottish architect William Adam and his sons, of whom Robert (1728–1792) and ...

, Jacobean, and even

Arts and Crafts The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the Decorative arts, decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and ...

. The house was fully electrified, with a central vacuum system, recirculating hot water, and a ten-port shower in the master bathroom.

Modifications

With the acquisition of the Armstrong mansion in 1935 for the home of a city college, initially named Armstrong Junior College, the need for facilities led to the demolition of most of the carriage house and gardens and the construction of Herschel V. Jenkins Hall, also designed by Henrik Wallin. When the property became the offices of Bouhan, Williams & Levy law firm in 1970, Herschel V. Jenkins Hall was demolished to make room for parking. Numerous non-structural modifications were made throughout to accommodate the law practice. With the restoration of the property begun in 2017 (see below), the gardens and a portion of the carriage house has been recreated.

In popular culture

The Armstrong Kessler Mansion setting has appeared frequently in popular culture. The house was used as the school of the protagonist's daughter in ''Cape Fear'', the 1962 psychological thriller starring

Robert Mitchum Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American actor. He is known for his antihero roles and film noir appearances. He received nominations for an Academy Award and a BAFTA Award. He received a star on the Holl ...

Gregory Peck Eldred Gregory Peck (April 5, 1916 – June 12, 2003) was an American actor and one of the most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1970s. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Peck the AFI's 100 Years...100 Stars, 12th-greatest male ...

Martin Balsam Martin Henry Balsam (November 4, 1919 – February 13, 1996) was an American actor. He had a prolific career in character roles in film, in theatre, and on television. An early member of the Actors Studio, he began his career on the New ...

, and

Polly Bergen Polly Bergen (born Nellie Paulina Burgin; July 14, 1930 – September 20, 2014) was an American actress, singer, television host, writer, and entrepreneur. She won an Emmy Award in 1958 for her performance as Helen Morgan (singer), Helen ...

. The house also appeared as the real-life law office of attorney

Sonny Seiler Frank W. "Sonny" Seiler (February 20, 1933 – August 28, 2023) was an American trial attorney from Savannah, Georgia, who had a leading role in the true-crime book ''Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil''. He was the owner of the University o ...

in the film ''Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil'', a 1997 American crime drama film based on the novel by

John Berendt John Berendt (born December 5, 1939) is an American author, known for writing the best-selling non-fiction book '' Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil'', which was a finalist for the 1995 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction, and '' The Ci ...

and directed by

Clint Eastwood Clinton Eastwood Jr. (born May 31, 1930) is an American actor and film director. After achieving success in the Western (genre), Western TV series ''Rawhide (TV series), Rawhide'', Eastwood rose to international fame with his role as the "Ma ...

Restoration

The present owner, the preservationist-hotelier Richard C. Kessler, who acquired the mansion in 2017, commissioned a complete restoration of the Armstrong property. The structure, interior, and Italianate landscape are being restored as closely as possible to the original design with original materials. The architect and urban designer Christian Sottile developed the master plan for restoration. Interiors have been carried out by the designer Chuck Chewning. The plan includes a two-story recreation of the carriage house and the addition of a reflecting pool centered on the carriage house. The porte-cochere,

carriage house A ''carriage house'', also called a ''remise'' or ''coach house'', is a term used in North America to describe an outbuilding that was originally built to house horse-drawn carriages and their related tack. Carriage houses were often two ...

, and garden pavilion frame a formal garden with fountains and Italian cypresses.Sottile, “Armstrong Mansion” video documentation.

Notes

Bibliography

*“House of George F. Armstrong, Savannah, Georgia.” ''The American Architect''. Vol. CXVI, No. 2276, August 6, 1919. *Kigar, Taylor. “Houses with History.” Savannah.com. Posted on August 15, 2014 http://www.savannah.com/houses-with-history/ *McAlester, Virginia and Lee McAlester. ''A Field Guide to American Houses''. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984. *Nussbaum, Katie. “A century of Savannah history: Richard Kessler returning Armstrong mansion to residential roots.” ''Savannah Morning News'' online, February 3, 2018. https://www.savannahnow.com/news/2018-02-03/century-savannah-history-richard-kessler-returning-armstrong-mansion-residential (accessed March 1, 2019). *“Savannah Scenes: Cape Fear (1962).” Bonnie Blue Tours Blog. https://www.bonniebluetours.com/blog/2013/09/04/savannah-scenes-1-cape-fear-1962 (accessed March 5, 2019). *Sottile, Christian. “Armstrong Kessler Mansion - Renovation of A Savannah Icon.” Video documentation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwefrBGL70c (accessed March 5, 2019). *Stone, Janet D. ''From the Mansion to the University: A History of Armstrong Atlantic State University 1935-2010''. Savannah, Ga.: Armstrong Atlantic State University, 2010.

External links

{{Commons category, Armstrong Mansion (Savannah)
Armstrong Kessler Mansion history and restoration video documentation
- YouTube, June 6, 2018 Houses completed in 1917 Office buildings in Savannah, Georgia Houses in Savannah, Georgia Savannah Historic District 1917 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)