NRF promotes and invests in the architectural heritage of the Newport community, the traditional building trades, and Doris Duke’s fine and decorative arts collections, for the enjoyment, education and inspiration of all.
As a leader in the preservation of early American architecture, NRF supports research and education in areas directly related to its collections and issues of critical concern to the field of historic preservation.
Visit Doris Duke’s art-filled mansion and enjoy panoramic ocean views from the extensive grounds. Open late March to November.
The Vernon House is a site for expansive story-telling, contemporary dialogue, and preservation trades skill-building.
Newport Restoration Foundation holds one of the largest collections of period architecture owned by a single organization anywhere in the United States.
Celebrate excellence in historic preservation efforts within the City of Newport, Rhode Island.
Live amidst history by renting one of our many historic properties.
The Whitehorne House Museum is a museum of Newport furniture that celebrates the craftsman (and woman)- ship, artistry, and industry of 18th-century Newport furniture and related decorative arts.
This season, explore extraordinary examples from the collection in the new Newport Galleries of Art, Design, and Craft—now on view at Rough Point Museum (680 Belleview Avenue).
Visit our online museum store!
The products of the Newport Restoration Foundation Store celebrate the life and passions of our founder, Doris Duke. We invite you to explore our curated collections—including unique, one-of-a-kind pieces inspired by our museums’ design, collections, and stories— exclusively available here.
Click here to start shopping from home or visit shopnewportrestoration.org.
Whitehorne House Museum is open by appointment only. Please email visit@newportrestoration.org for more information.
Many spectacular examples from the Whitehorne collection are on display at Rough Point Museum this year in the Newport Galleries of Art, Design, and Craft. Visit today!
416 Thames Street Newport, RI 401–846–4152 ext. 123 visit@newportrestoration.org
Limited metered parking available.
Portrait of Rebecca Taylor Orne by Joseph Badger
Benjamin Baker Highboy
19th-century watercolor showing John Goddard’s house and workshop
Carver Chair with braided cornhusk seat
Tankard by Samuel Vernon
Pier table by John Goddard
Benjamin Baker was active as a very prolific chair maker in Newport from 1760, and is also known to have made clock cases, tables and case furniture that was produced primarily for export to the coastal trade. Among the many Newport characteristics found on the highboy is the use of cabriole legs with pad feet on the rear in combination with open-talon claw and ball front legs -- a Newport practice for furniture intended to stand against the wall. Another Newport trait is the elongated ball and claw foot with webless talons having an extended grip over the ball, which in this case are undercut. Of special interest is the intaglio carved petal and leaf motif decorating the knees, a feature frequently found on Newport highboys and tea tables. A focal point is the beautifully carved shell motif, also a favorite decorative device of the high style Newport cabinetmakers. Here it is further decorated at the center with a fleur-de-lys. The most unusual feature of the Whitehorne House Museum’s high chest are the three drawers in the top row of the upper case.
Watercolor painting depicting John Goddard's house in the Easton's Point neighborhood of Newport, RI. The composition includes two houses and dock scene with beach. Written in pencil script, bottom right corner: Old Newport houses, 1865. In bottom left corner, in pencil: S.C.
This armchair is one of a group of three that demonstrates a strong Dutch influence on some of the earliest furniture made in Newport, RI. It also speaks to connections, perhaps less well known, with local Native American craft production. Unique to the Whitehorne example is the braided cornhusk seat, possibly woven by local Wampanoag or Narragansett weavers. This is an unusual feature found in other early chairs associated with Little Compton, which remained a fairly isolated agricultural outpost into the twentieth century but had early ties through families such as the Browns, who owned this chair, to nearby Aquidneck Island and the urban centers of Portsmouth and Newport, as well as to local Native American craftsmen. The red paint with gold decoration dates to the Victorian period; it covers a layer of blue paint, date unknown, but also not likely original.
A silver tankard with a tapering cylindrical barrel with molded lip and foot. It has an s-scroll handle parting from a drop motif and terminating in an oval shield. A dome cover with a spiral thumbpiece and formal bud finial cover the tankard. "LRP" is engraved on the handle and the scratchweight 29 ounces is marked on body and handle. Stamped with "SV" maker's mark on body and handle.