We joined Historic New England last year (our gateway being Hamilton House). We’ve worked our way through several Maine and New Hampshire properties, and decided to take advantage of a friend’s cookout in the Boston area to add a few Massachusetts properties to the list. The first was Beauport, which ended up being even more fantastic than the write up led me to believe it would be.
Henry Sleeper was one of the first true interior designers, and the house is a showcase of his work. And one of the things he did was find old colonial houses that were being torn down, and repurpose the interiors, like the paneling, or old doors. It’s got a very particular aesthetic in the collections on display, and was just so cool to walk through. We plan on coming back for one of the special three hours tours that they do that allows you to see every room. (You only get the highlights on the regular tour, but they’re plenty interesting.)