"All View" 



House of C. Oliver Iselin, Esq., Premium Point, New Rochelle, New York 



HETHER taken in its most literal sense or not, Mr. Iselin has devised a very happy and 

 delightfully descriptive name for his house in New Rochelle, New York. A garden by 

 the waterside would be equally expressive, for his house stands on the tip of Premium 

 Point, which juts out into Long Island Sound at New Rochelle, and gives it a water 

 view at once extensive and beautiful. Very lovely and peaceful it is here, with the gentle 

 calm of rippling water softly washing the green shores, with their low rocked points — a coast 

 thronged with strange-shaped stretches of land into the water, as though both land and water 

 had fought for supremacy, and then rested in the quiet beauty which now so distinguishes 

 them. There is no solitary outlook here, but one of ravishing variety, the land and water so 

 intermingled that it is hard to tell if one be island or peninsula, the other bay or river, lake 

 or sound — a landscape dotted with pleasant houses, enclosed, in the background, with groups 

 and groves of trees. 



Mr. Iselin has for his house, therefore, almost every possible qualification of beauty in 

 its surroundings. A dwelling so environed must be stately and fine, and the architect has 

 risen to the full measure of his opportunity. The splendid front has a recessed center, with 

 two end wings slightly projecting. The corners of these wings are supported by immense 

 pilasters, which rise to the top of the main cornice. The uppermost story is treated as an attic, 

 a central curve in the wings giving space for a window, and creating a fine silhouette for the 

 roof line. The great pilasters are so completely the feature of the wings, and, in a sense, of 

 the whole front, that the windows enclosed within them are plainly framed in the white marble 

 which is used for the ornamental parts and encased in the walls of solid brick. 



The distinguished severity which characterizes the end pavilions gives way in the center 

 of the front to a freer and more ornamental treatment. The central wall is, indeed, quite festal in 

 character. The entrance, in the center, is a very charming structure in white marble, completely 

 filling the space occupied by the ground floor and the story above it. The round arched opening 

 is supported by pilasters, and the terrace of the roof is enclosed within a balustrade. The 

 doorway under the porch is rectangular, and the whole is finely detailed and beautifully executed. 

 The walls of the two upper stories are treated as window-galleries : two on each side of the porch 

 in the first story, and eight — a beautifully glazed series — in the upper story. The modest 

 dormers in the attic are in good contrast with the bolder treatment of the ends. 



The gardens of "All View" are extraordinarily fine, and their own great inherent 

 beauty is enhanced by their close juxtaposition to the water. The large formal garden is entirely 



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