Richard Morris Hunt

Richard Morris Hunt 1828-95, American architect, b. Brattleboro, Vt., studied in Geneva, Switzerland, and at the École des Beaux-Arts; brother of William Morris Hunt . He was a leading practitioner of 19th-century eclecticism. Hunt worked under T. U. Walter on the extensions of the Capitol at Washington, D.C. In New York City he founded the first American studio for training young architects, and he was one of the organizers of the American Institute of Architects, of which he became president in 1888. Most of his work was closely imitative of historic styles. It included the Lenox Library, New York City (later torn down); the first building for the Fogg Museum of Art, Cambridge, Mass.; the U.S. naval observatory at Washington, D.C.; the pedestal for the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor; and numerous magnificent residences, such as those of the Vanderbilts in New York City and Newport, R.I., and the Biltmore House in Asheville, N.C. His Tribune Building in New York was one of the first elevator buildings.

Bibliography: See biography by P. R. Baker (1980).

Hunt, Richard Morris (1827–95) US architect. Influenced by French Gothic and Italian Renaissance style, he is best known for the large town and country houses he built for the wealthy. Examples are “Biltmore” in North Carolina and “The Breakers” in Newport, Rhode Island.