Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens, Art museum and historic mansion in River Oaks, Houston, United States.
Bayou Bend is a 14-acre estate in River Oaks, Houston, holding the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston's collection of American decorative arts. Architect John F. Staub designed the 1927–28 mansion, combining 18th-century Georgian forms with Southern and Spanish Creole elements. Inside, 28 period rooms display about 4,700 objects made between 1620 and 1870, including floorboards and paneling from two 18th-century Massachusetts houses.
Ima Hogg and her brothers William C. and Michael Hogg built the house between 1927 and 1928, with John F. Staub as architect; it was among the first homes in River Oaks. Hogg donated the house, gardens and collection to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in 1957, and Bayou Bend opened to the public in 1966. The city named it an official landmark in February 1999.
Ima Hogg began the collection in 1920 after admiring a Queen Anne armchair in Wayman Adams's studio; she later bought that same chair. The 28 period rooms hold about 4,700 objects made between 1620 and 1870, including English ceramics used in colonial America. Staub fitted Miss Hogg's bedroom and sitting room with floorboards and paneling from two 18th-century Massachusetts houses.
The mansion and gardens are open for guided tours from Wednesday through Sunday, with visits beginning in the morning hours. Wear comfortable shoes since you will walk through many interior rooms and outdoor garden areas.
Only one tree was removed during the creation of the formal gardens because Ima Hogg insisted on keeping the natural landscape intact. This approach makes the grounds around the mansion feel organically grown rather than artificially constructed.
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