AD100 Architects and Designers' Most Inspiring Travel Destinations
Hearst Castle
Madeline Stuart
Interior Designer
"At Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California, the remarkable architect Julia Morgan worked with her peripatetic client William Randolph Hearst to incorporate myriad decorative elements—ceilings, fireplaces—found abroad. A brilliantly successful collaboration."
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Thomas a. Kligerman, Ike Kligerman Barkley
Architect
"At least once a year I visit the Stanford White–designed dining room at Kingscote, a Gothic Revival mansion in Newport, Rhode Island. It has an incredibly rich mix of marble, cork, mahogany, tile, oak, and Tiffany glass."
Pictured here is an interior of Hearst Castle.
Abbaye Notre-Dame de Sénanque
Rose Tarlow
Interior Designer
"Go to the Abbaye Notre-Dame de Sénanque in Provence in June, when the lavender is out and the monks are chanting in the garden."
Thomas O’Brien, Aero Studios
Interior Designer
"Time pauses quietly while I’m looking at the bedroom from Venice’s Sagredo Palace that is installed at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Even though the interior is seductively elaborate, it has such a peaceful spirit."
Pictured here is a field of lavender at the Abbaye Notre-Dame de Sénanque in Provence, France.
Villa Tugendhat
Allan Greenberg
Architect
"The Villa Tugendhat in Brno, Czech Republic, is not only the apogee of Mies van der Rohe’s work in Europe but also his most important residential design, with sublime materials and uniquely articulated separations between the interiors and the garden."
the Chinese Palace at Oranienbaum
Veere Grenney
Interior Designer
"Commissioned by Catherine the Great and conceived by architect Antonio Rinaldi, the 18th-century Chinese Palace at Oranienbaum, near St. Petersburg, Russia, is one of the world’s great decorating wonders. The salon’s glass-beaded walls are breathtaking—unlike anything I’ve ever seen."
Pictured here is the glass-beaded salon.
U.S. Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel
Emily Summers
Interior Designer
"We take anyone who visits us in Colorado Springs on a tour of the U.S. Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel, built by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in 1963. It was inspired by flight, a theme that is evident in the winglike spires and the pews that resemble propellers.
30 Rockefeller Plaza
John Berson, Sawyer | Berson
Architect
"The lobby at Manhattan’s 30 Rockefeller Plaza is pure and uncompromising Art Deco."
Mount Vernon
Gil Schafer
Architect
"Mount Vernon, George Washington’s Virginia home, manages to be both supremely elegant and surprisingly low-key. The grand façade has an almost wonky feel, with little regard to symmetry."
The Doge’s Palace
Brian J. McCarthy
Interior Designer
"The Doge’s Palace in Venice defies imagination. I’ve spent entire afternoons just absorbing the energy of the place, reveling in the light that streams through the windows. It’s even more magical in the evening, when the crowds thin and the city descends into quiet."
Villa Kérylos
William T. Georgis
Architect/Designer
"I love the Villa Kérylos on France’s Côte d’Azur. The nostalgia for an imagined past is poignant and palpable throughout the neoclassical house, which was constructed in the early 20th century. Its beauty is sublime."
Kuskovo Estate
Juan Pablo Molyneux
Interior Designer
"Built in the 1700s by architect Karl Blank for Count Pyotr Sheremetev, the Kuskovo estate on the outskirts of Moscow is one of the most noble and majestic neoclassical buildings."
Katsura Imperial Villa
Toshiko Mori
Architect
"Kyoto’s Katsura Imperial Villa is an example of architecture that is totally integrated with its landscape. The sequence of spaces exposes you to the weather and seasons, exciting the senses and enhancing every moment."
David Mann, MR Architecture + DECOR
Architect/Designer
"At the 1937 Grace Miller house in Palm Springs you can see that Richard Neutra and his client did not rely upon the tried-and-true but instead cleverly rethought how to live in a better, smarter way."
Pictured here is the Katsura Imperial Villa in Kyoto.
Tate Modern
Mariette Himes Gomez
Interior Designer
"Upon entering the Turbine Hall at London’s Tate Modern, I can’t help but be wonderfully overwhelmed by its vast scale and think of the structure’s former life as a power station."
Sant’Ivo alla Sapienza
David Piscuskas, 1100 Architect
Architect
"The Baroque chapel of Rome’s Sant’Ivo alla Sapienza cathedral sets a richly ambiguous tone—at once dynamic and serene. I consider it a clarion to the power of design."
Château de Tanlay
Martyn Lawrence Bullard
Interior Designer
"With its moat, turrets, and extraordinary obelisks, the Château de Tanlay, in Burgundy, is a French fairy tale come true.
American Bar
Rafael de Cárdenas
Architect/Designer
"At Adolf Loos’s American Bar in Vienna, the reflections of the geometric coffered ceiling in the walls’ mirrored panels envelop you with a sense of endlessness, while a grid of amber-color glass suggests eternal daybreak."
Nossa Senhora do Pilar Church
Richard Keith Langham
Interior Designer
"The unassuming exterior of the Nossa Senhora do Pilar church in Ouro Preto, Brazil, belies the gilded explosion that is its Baroque interior. Every surface gleams."
John Barman
Interior Designer
"Although the Galleria Doria Pamphilj in Rome functions as a museum, it’s also a private residence, home to the same family since the 18th century. As a result, the palace is full of remarkable objects that have always inhabited the space."
Pictured here is the interior of Nossa Senhora do Pilar church in Ouro Preto, Brazil.
Woodland Cemetery
Juan Montoya
Interior Designer
"Designed in the early 1900s, Gunnar Asplund and Sigurd Lewerentz’s Woodland Cemetery in Stockholm is a true source of inspiration, its gardens leading to a series of amazing buildings with their own particular vernacular. You feel transported."
Thomas Jefferson’s Great Lawn
__Bunny Williams
__Interior Designer
"Thomas Jefferson’s great lawn and rotunda at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville convey an incredible elegance and style without being big and overwhelming. It’s exactly the sense of scale I want to create in everything I do."
Château de Groussay Library
Robert Couturier
Architect/Designer
"The library at the Château de Groussay, near Versailles, is glorious because it is beyond all rules, at once comfortable and grand. It has been copied many times but never with the original’s artful beauty."
Notre Dame du Haut Chapel
Richard Landry Architect
"I vividly remember visiting Le Corbusier’s Notre Dame du Haut chapel in Ronchamp, France, just after graduating from architecture school. I kept sketching its sculptural façade while attempting to understand how such a small building could both dominate its site and feel so integrated."
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Oscar Shamamian, Ferguson & Shamamian
Architect
"The North Cornwall Meeting House, near my home in Connecticut, is profoundly soulful. While it’s rich in early-19th-century architectural detail, it still has a restrained interior that leaves you completely at peace."
Pictured here is Le Corbusier’s Notre Dame du Haut chapel in Ronchamp, France.
1922 R. M. Schindler Home
Ron Radziner, Marmol Radziner
Architect
"The 1922 house that R. M. Schindler designed for himself in West Hollywood was one of the most radical buildings in the world when it was built. I’m especially inspired by the raw quality of the materials—redwood and tilt-up concrete slabs."
Topkapi Palace
Mica Ertegun, MAC II
Interior Designer
"I am impressed but not always touched by architecture, yet I find the intricate coloring and design of the tile walls and ceilings of Istanbul’s Topkapi Palace unforgettable."
William Sofield
Interior Designer
"The great power and beauty of the Tiffany Room at New York’s Park Avenue Armory is born from a collision between the values of the Aesthetic Movement and the brutality of the Industrial Revolution. Common materials are reinvented with such artistry and imagination that the room becomes a celebration of all things exotic and tactile."
Pictured here is a ceiling in Istanbul’s Topkapi Palace.