A29: South Carolina Ballroom, 1775–1835

Narcissa Niblack Thorne, creator of the Thorne Rooms, combined a deep knowledge of design history with a vivid imaginative sensibility. In the 1930s, she assembled a team of skilled artisans in Chicago to construct a series of intricately detailed interiors at the scale of one inch to one foot (1:12).

Conceived as a visual history of interior design, the rooms are at once scholarly and inventive. Meticulously researched and carefully composed, they balance historical accuracy with artistic interpretation. Each atmospheric interior feels like a stage set awaiting its occupants—two parts fantasy, one part history, and entirely absorbing.

Entry from Fannia Weingartner, Miniature Rooms: The Thorne Rooms at the Art Institute of Chicago, 2nd ed. (The Art Institute of Chicago, 2004):

29: South Carolina Ballroom, 1775–1835
The principal sources for this elegant interior were architectural elements from the first-floor hall and second-floor ballroom of the William Gibbes house at 64 South Battery in Charleston. A planter and merchant, Gibbes built the handsome, three-story clapboarded dwelling, described as “of the purest Georgian style,” in 1772. A man of wealth and culture, he had the residence designed in a combination of local and English styles. After the Revolution, the house passed to Sarah Moore Smith and remained in the same family for four generations. Around 1800 some of the rooms were remodeled in the Adam style. Descriptions of the house indicate that much of the Georgian woodwork, originally imported from England, was ornamented at this time with hard-putty decoration.
One of these renovated interiors was the ballroom, which has been praised for its imported Italian stucco ceiling, wood-paneled walls, mantel, and wide-plank flooring. The Adam influence is immediately apparent in the cornice, doorway, and window surrounds of Mrs. Thorne’s interior. The two monumental columns at the rear of the model, however, are actually located in the broad hall that runs the full length of the Gibbes house. Several elements of this interior, especially the Palladian-style window at the rear of the room, were inspired by another Charleston dwelling, the Radcliffe-King house, built in 1806.
The Gibbes residence survived the Revolution, the Civil War, and an earthquake in 1886 relatively undamaged. In 1930 it was bought and extensively restored by Mrs. Washington A. Roebling, whose husband had helped build the Brooklyn Bridge.
In furnishing this interior Mrs. Thorne chose to imitate primarily American Empire pieces of the kind made fashionable by New York furniture makers, who were very popular in Charleston at this time. The sofa was modeled after an example from between 1810 and 1820, which is also the period when the original of the mahogany combination desk and bookcase along the right wall was made. Featuring stencil decorations between and on the pilasters themselves, the piece has striking ornate legs and gilt feet, as does the companion console table against the left wall. The closed armchair to the right of the pier table is a reproduction of one of a pair inlaid with brass, a type made popular by the highly regarded furniture maker Duncan Phyfe (see A–14: Pennsylvania Drawing Room, 1834–36). The piano reproduces one made by John Tallman of New York in 1825. The musical instruments, the torchères in front of the columns, the ornamental urns on the mantel, and the vases of flowers enhance the impressions of elegance and cultivation that Mrs. Thorne wished to convey in this interior.
This room measures 15 1/2 x 19 3/4 x 30 7/8 inches.