“I
t was totally overgrown and neglected,” Lisa Fischetti recalls as she surveys the extraordinary brick-and-timber house that she and her husband, Ralph Lerner, rescued a little more than 14 years ago. “But we knew at once we must have it.” There are many historic houses in Princeton, but few, perhaps, were built not for humans, but for cows and sheep. Lisa and Ralph’s house, known as the Barn, was conceived by Moses Pyne in the late 1890s as part of a romantic agricultural landscape. Pyne had already purchased Drumthwacket (the enormous Greek Revival house now used as the Governor’s Mansion) as well as the adjoining 138 acres (which today encompass Princeton Battlefield Park). His dream, following the late 19th-century fad for “picturesque” living, was to create a Utopian agrarian complex based on the organic ideals of Shelburne Farms in Vermont; that is to say, to build a farmer’s house, dairy, and barn to the standards of the picturesque landscape movement. Yet Pyne’s was not a fanciful notion like that of Marie Antoinette at the Petit Trianon, which was basically a place for her to play in. Moses Pyne intended to create a working farm, complete with cattle and sheep — albeit beautiful cattle and sheep — in the gorgeous rural setting. The architect of Pyne’s grand venture was Raleigh Gildersleeve, who also designed Pyne’s contributions to Princeton University, namely the Pyne dormitories (1896) and McCosh Hall (1906). Gildersleeve was a Southerner who trained as an architect in Berlin, embracing the principles of the European Arts and Crafts movement. The Barn is an excellent example of his idiosyncratic talent. He sited the building high on a hill overlooking the battlefield grounds, which Pyne had appropriated as a pasture for his animals. A classical U-shape, the Barn has a symmetrical central courtyard framed on each side by stable wings and a brick-and-timber facade, following the rustic traditions of the Arts and Crafts style. Gildersleeve added two towers in the German vernacular, each five stories high. A dairy and a farmer’s house were constructed in the same style, creating a complex of similarly designed, interconnected buildings, just as Pyne had envisioned. The Barn, completed around 1902, created a charming background for the farm animals that grazed in its courtyard and slept in its stables — until 1911, when it burned down. Pyne immediately had it rebuilt to its original state. But he died 10 years later, and after his wife’s passing in 1939, the complex was broken up.
RIGHT: The street entrance into the Lerner/Fischetti office wing. FACING: The main “back alley” features a breakfast area and piano where many a music recital has been conducted.
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