Henry E Huntington Library and Art Gallery, San Marino
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From Los Angeles the way to this museum complex (1151 Oxford Road, San Marino) is via the Pasadena Freeway (exit for Altadena/Arroyo), or by taking bus no. 432, but this service is not very frequent.As unusual as the museum itself is its history. Like so many others, Collis Huntington, a small shopkeeper in Oneonta in New York State, left the town of his birth in 1849 to go in search of gold in distant California.
Henry E Huntington Library and Art Gallery Map
Important Information:
Official site:
www.huntington.org
Address:
1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA 91108-1218, United States
Opening hours:
May 25 to Sep 7: 10:30am-4:30pm; Closed: Tue
Sep 8 to May 24: 12pm-4:30pm; Sun: 10:30am-4:30pm; Sat: 10:30am-4:30pm; Closed: Tue
Sep 8 to May 24: 12pm-4:30pm; Sun: 10:30am-4:30pm; Sat: 10:30am-4:30pm; Closed: Tue
Always closed on: New Year's Day (Jan 1), Memorial Day - USA (last Monday, May), American Independance Day (Jul 4), Labor Day - USA (1st Monday, Sep), Thanksgiving - USA (4th Thursday, Nov), Christmas - Christian (Dec 25), Christmas Eve - Christian (Dec 24), Easter - Christian
Entrance fee in USD:
Adult $20.00, Senior over 65 $15.00, Child 18 & under $10.00, Child 11 & under $6.00, Child 5 & under FREE
Useful tips: Admission is free on the first Thursday of every month.
Informal photography and video taping is permitted throughout the institution. Flashbulbs and tripods may not be used in buildings. Professional or commercial photography by appointment only.
You are recommended to arrange Sunday visits by telephone because the crush is particularly heavy on that day. There is a guided tour through the Botanical Gardens every day at 1 pm.
June to August open 10:30 - 16:30 Tuesday - Sunday
Disability Access: Full facilities for persons with disabilities.
Facilities: Gift shop, Restaurant or food service, Wheelchair loan or rental
Related Attractions
Huntington Library - Huntington Botanical Gardens
If the treasures in the museum and gallery at the Huntington Library were the only things to see, they would be quite sufficient to fill the three and a half hours allowed to visitors each day. However, the beauties of nature displayed in the gardens easily match the aesthetic pleasures experienced inside the building. Each of the gardens, here blended into a whole, will attract its own admirers. Most visitors, however, make for the Japanese garden which, with its red bridge, traditional Japanese five-roomed house, the Ikebana house, traditional Bonsai trees and little Zen Garden, inspires them just to sit and meditate.Other parts of the grounds are: the Herb Garden, the Shakespeare Garden with plants such as existed in the poet's time, the Desert Garden and - in direct contrast - the Jungle Garden, the Rose Garden and two Camellia Gardens, the Palm Garden and the Subtropical Garden and finally, just behind the mausoleum where the Huntingtons lie buried, the Orange Grove.
Huntington Library - Literary Art Treasures
The treasures of the Huntington Library such as the Ellesmere Manuscript from Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" dating from 1410, and, in the same display cabinet, numerous superbly illuminated books of hours dating from the Middle Ages, are unique. You can then admire a two-volume Johannes Gutenberg bible, printed on parchment in 1455. Not far away can be seen some manuscript pages from Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, which he wrote between 1771 and 1790, leaving a half of each page empty for later amendments and corrections. Also displayed are the completely illegible "Forests" manuscript by Henry Thoreaus, letters by George Washington and Mark Twain, the Shakespeare Folio Edition, a copy of the large-format original edition of Audobon's "Birds of America" and much more. There are reading and work rooms available to academics, who have the choice of nearly four million items.
Virginia Steele Scott Gallery
The works of art at the Huntington Library are no longer housed solely in the villa, but also in a new building erected specially for the purpose, the Virginia Steele Scott Gallery. The superb collection is devoted mainly to American art, but also includes important English works of art of the 18th and 19th centuries, including "Blue Boy", Thomas Gainsborough's most famous painting, and the scarcely less famous "Pinkie" by Thomas Lawrence. Sir Joshua Reynolds, George Romney, Sir Henry Raeburn are all represented, as well as works by the French artists Fragonard, Houdon, Baptiste Greuze and François Hubert Drouais; particular mention should be made of the pictures of children which were obviously Arabella's favorite.
Huntington Library - Memorial Collection
The Arabella Huntington Memorial Collection, containing predominantly French sculptures from the 18th century, tapestries, porcelain and furniture from the same period, is housed in the west wing of the library.