Constant attributed her love for arranging flowers to a Japanese gentleman staying at her home, probably Genjiro Yeto. She recalled when he placed a single red rose in an old decanter: “From this time on…flower arranging has always been my foremost interest.”
Elmer Livingstone MacRae was living in New York City when he started taking classes from John Twachtman at the Holley House. MacRae may have had a studio in the Holley House as early as 1899, the year he moved into the house, one year before his marriage to Constant Holley.
Accommodations varied in the Holley House. The most comfortable room was located downstairs in the northeast corner of the house. Known as the best bedroom, this room was reserved for guests who could afford to pay for the extra space and comfort. Spacious, with an elegant Federal-era fireplace mantle and northeastern exposure from three large windows, this room had the nicest amenities.
Visitors entered through the front hall, whose colonial-era wainscoting “Dutch” door, wide plank flooring, circa 1850 staircase, and eclectic mix of Victorian and colonial furnishings were both charming and, in the case of artist Childe Hassam, ultimately became subject matter. The front hall appears much as it did in 1912 when Childe Hassam painted Clarissa MacRae sitting in front of the bookcase.
The attic room above the back kitchen wing of the house was likely used as living quarters for the people enslaved by the Bush family in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The Holley House was known as a place of gracious hospitality. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the dining room, where guests and family gathered for meals each day. Art colonists, their spouses, the Holley’s and MacRae’s, and invited guests gathered around the long table to share their experiences and ideas, an important aspect of art colony life.
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