Designing the Gilded Age: Drawings from the Studios of Louis C. Tiffany

The dazzling stained-glass windows, lamps, mosaics, and interiors from the studios of the visionary American artist Louis Comfort Tiffany—hallmarks of the Gilded Age—began as drawings created by the many talented designers in Tiffany’s studios. Designing the Gilded Age: Drawings from the Studios of Louis C. Tiffany showcases rare design drawings to take us behind the scenes of the studios where the drawings were made and ultimately transformed into enduring works of art. Intended for commissions dating from the mid-1880s through the 1920s in the U.S. and internationally, the nearly 120 luminous watercolor drawings present the first step in the artistic process for interiors and decorations for the grand mansions, civic and sacred spaces, and other buildings created during America’s Gilded Age, the post–Civil War era that saw an unprecedented accumulation of wealth.

Many of the drawings document works that have since been lost, damaged, or destroyed, while others showcase ideas for designs that were never realized. The exhibition also brings together extraordinary stained-glass windows, mosaics, enamelwork, and examples of the studio’s iconic lamps in side-by-side displays with their original designs, allowing a rare view of the journey from artistic conception to finished product. Virtually everything produced in Tiffany’s workshops was the result of a collaborative process; the initial steps took place in the studio where artists Tiffany hired—often émigrés and women—realized his vision.

The featured drawings, all from The Met collection, have never before been studied in depth, and the exhibition celebrates the decades-long conservation initiative that restored them to their full beauty. Along with new insights into the artists’ process and design inspiration, the drawings offer a unique opportunity to peel back the layers of some of the most heralded creations produced by Tiffany's legendary studios.