Boxhill (Louisville)

Winkworth or Boxhill is a residential building in Georgian architecture in Glenview, a small town east of Louisville, Kentucky in the United States. Boxhill was built in 1910 and 1983, the National Register of Historic Places added.

Like many other nearby country seats - for example Lincliff - reflects Boxhill against the period of the history of Louisville before the turn of the 20th century, built in the wealthy Louis Bettviller showpieces on the banks of the Ohio River east of downtown Louisville. Of these country seats 29 buildings have been preserved; they form the largest such collection in the 1578 km long river and are among the best preserved ensembles with buildings from this period in the United States.

Description

In Boxhill is a two-story brick house with a gable roof, interior chimneys and a facade with five bays. The portico has a triangular pediment, an elliptical bezel and is supported by paired columns of the Ionic order. The side of the entrance are small windows.

The house was altered in 1956. The project was created by architect Louis Bettviller Stratton Hammon. Hammon added a cast-iron balcony. The original one-story wing only on the western side of the main building Hammon added a second floor added. He was careful to take over the materials and shapes of the original building. The house sits on a bluff above the Ohio River. The driveway to the house is a narrow tree-lined road that winds upwards of River Road and ends at an esplanade with two parallel roadways.

History

The original builder of the property, which still bore the name Winkworth at the time, William E. Chess was. He obtained in 1906 the 75 acre property. Construction of the house was completed in 1910, in 1917 he gave the estate to his daughter Mary Grace Chess Robinson. This was the Avery Robinson, the vice president of a rope factory. Mrs. Robinson was later in the 1930s in New York City founder of the company Mary Chess Perfume and Cosmetics Company. The Robinsons lived until 1923 in the house. Then they moved first to London and later to New York City. They sold the house to Henning Chambers, a securities dealer in New York City.

In the 1950s, the property was divided. Traces of the once extensive gardens, terraces and stone walls are still visible. It is believed that the gardens and tree-lined driveway of Bryant Fleming was designed, a landscape architect from Buffalo, New York. He had in 1911 planned a house on the upper River Road and the landscaping of other objects in the vicinity were attributed to him.

The subsequent owner of the property, Robert and Shirley Alexander were killed in Boxhill 1977 by her stepson. It was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and the offender was judged unfit to stand trial. Since the property was the scene of a murder, could the bank that owns the estate came, it did not sell for three years. The building contractor Helen Combs bought it in 1980 for $ 355,000 and renovated it. Combs intended to live in the house itself, but her husband Bert T. Combs, the former governor of Kentucky, was not enthusiastic about the idea and described the property as " murder house". Combs sold the house in 1982.