Newport Mansions
Gilded Age summer houses on the Newport cliffs, built at enormous cost for seasons that lasted a few weeks.
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In the decades either side of 1900 the richest families in the country built summer houses along Bellevue Avenue, and the scale is the point: The Breakers, built for Cornelius Vanderbilt II in 1895, has seventy rooms in the manner of a Genoese palace; Marble House cost a reported eleven million dollars in 1892 money, much of it in marble; Rosecliff was modelled on a Versailles garden pavilion. They were occupied for a season of perhaps six to eight weeks a year. Several are run as museums by the Preservation Society. The Cliff Walk runs behind them for about five kilometres between the lawns and the sea, free and public, which is the other half of the visit.
What you actually see
- The Breakers - seventy rooms, Vanderbilt, finished 1895.
- Marble House and Rosecliff - the other set pieces on Bellevue.
- Houses used a few weeks a year - the fact that frames all of it.
- The Cliff Walk - about five kilometres between lawns and sea.
When to go
May to October for full opening. A full day for two or three houses.
Honest expectations
Each house is a separate ticket unless you buy a combination. Summer queues are long. Interiors are crowded and timed. Parts of the Cliff Walk close after storms.
Nearby
Newport harbour is west; Fort Adams is on the point.
What to pack for Newport Mansions
Chosen from what this place is for. Tap a kit for the full checklist.
Opening times, ticket prices and seasonal closures change - check the official source before you go: official site.
