The Booth House is a single-story modernist house in Bedford, New York. Built in 1946, the house was American architect Philip Johnson's first residential commission, and is a stylistic precursor to Johnson's better-known 1949 Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut.
The house's concrete block and plate glass exterior is supported by steel beams and columns, and its interior features a large masonry fireplace. Its design was influenced by Johnson's mentors. Landis Gores described the house as a "cross-breed in concrete block between [Johnson's] Lincoln project for [Professor] Bogner and [Le Corbusier's] De Mandrot house from which it had taken its origin: a raised podium."
History Johnson designed the house for Richard and Olga Booth, a young couple who wanted a weekend house near Manhattan. Architectural photographer Robert Damora and architect Sirkka Damora purchased the house in 1955 for $23,500 and lived there for 55 years. Sirkka said at the time that the couple had wanted a modernist house but did not think much of its significance.
In 2010, the widowed Sirkka Damora put the house, an studio building, and their lot up for sale, with an asking price of $2 million. The house was again placed for sale in 2017 for $1 million, and it was ultimately sold for $1.1 million to a group that included art adviser Thomas Rom. This group bought two other lots and initially intended to build a new house before deciding to sell the parcel containing the Booth House. The house was placed for sale for $1.9 million in 2024, and it was sold in 2026 to builder Ravi Arps and architect Drew Lang.
See also
List of works by Philip Johnson
References