Conservatory at the Darwin Martin House, c. 1910. Image source: Martin House Restoration Corporation
Conservatory at the Darwin Martin House, c. 1910. Image source: Martin House Restoration Corporation
The Darwin D. Martin House Complex on Jewett Parkway included a pergola and conservatory
which were demolished in the early 1960s. The Martin House Restoration Corporation began
reconstruction of the pergola,conservatory and carriage house in the fall of 2004. In June, 2007,
one of the prominent symbols of the Martin estate, the replica Nike of Samothrace, was installed
in its setting in the apse of the conservatory.
2007 view
Architect Frank Lloyd Wright had used replicas of the Nike in several of his other
buildings, and there was a Nike in the reception area of the Larkin Administration Building on
Seneca Street in Buffalo. But the Nike he specified for this space was full-size: nine feet, six inches.
Slides of the restoration of the conservatory over time.
Detail of the 2007 Nike of Samothrace in place.
The Martin House Restoration Corporation was fortunate to receive funds for the creation
of the Nike replica from long-time Martin House volunteer Judy Kieffer, who made the donation
in her late husband Jim's memory. Although the original replica likely deteriorated over time
because it was plaster, the 2007 replica was cast in fiberglass resin and finished with the same
pearly wash as the first replica.
Architectural Plan c. 1910. Yellow shading represents the pergola, green the conservatory. Image source: Library of Congress
Martin House curator Jack Quinan summarized the significance of this Nike placement thus:
"The Nike vista also carried a powerful personal message for Darwin Martin, one that is key to the
experience of the Martin House. Upon pasisng through the principal entrance to the house, one's
vision was immediately drawn to the distant Nike, the ancient Greek personification of Victory,
brilliantly realized by its anonymous sculptor as a synthesis of human and animal forms caught
at the momentof alighting on the prow of a ship at sea. By placing Nike at the vanishing point of
the long pergola, Wright transformed into architectural and sculptural terms a narrative of Darwin
Martin's life - the long and difficult journey fraught with loneliness and adversity that culminated in
wealth, prestige, a splendid home, a stable family."
Tours of the Darwin Martin House are available.
The Guist Gallery of Woburn, Massachusetts, created the Nike replica using its archive of
casts and molds of the original creators of the Martin House Nike, the firm of P.P. Caproni & Brother.