Mosaic House of Boerum Hill
Brooklyn, New York
These days most of "Brownstone Brooklyn" is tastefully upscale, but you can still find the occasional example of someone's uncontrolled and excessive decorative impulse. One dazzling instance is the Mosaic House of Boerum Hill. Since the building is just outside the boundaries of a historic district, its creator, Susan Gardner, has been free to encrust enthusiastically.
Gardner is a retired art professor who has lived in the neighborhood for over 40 years. She began her mosaic in earnest after 9/11, when she felt the need to get out of her studio and interact with people.
"One day in 2001," she wrote on her Mosaic House web page, "I went outside and started gluing things to the front of my house." Soon her summers off became a time to expand the artwork as it gradually climbed higher -- it's now about ten feet tall -- and grew to engulf window guards, door lock, mailbox, bench, and cast iron fence. The variety of small items that serve as ingredients for this visual stew include broken crockery, tile, toys, shells, stones, bits of mirror, and costume jewelry (especially butterflies).
Subtle seasonal changes are evident. Flowerboxes that hold live plants in warm weather are filled with colorful buttons for winter; strings of Mardi Gras beads are draped over the bare branches of one small tree out front to celebrate the Christmas season.
Although a few aesthetically conservative holdouts consider the Mosaic House an eyesore, the reaction to Gardner's work has generally been favorable. Neighbors drop off sparkly detritus, hoping to see their donations incorporated into the facade.
When it comes to transforming junk into joy, Susan Gardner has got it covered.
[ADB]