It was at the World's Columbian Exposition (also known as The Chicago World's Fair) that Louis Comfort Tiffany with his glass inlaid chapel, gained a reputation as a premiere glassmaker. While on display at the Exposition, it was been noted that the radience of the chapel created reverential awe amongst those who viewed it.
The chapel won many medals at the Exposition, including one for imaginative adaptation of the electrification of its imposing chandelier. After the Exposition, the chapel remained dismantled in New York until 1898, when a wealthy woman, Mrs. Celia Whipple Wallace bought the chapel for The Episcopal Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine - which was under construction in New York City. The chapel remained at St. John the Divine for about 10 years. In 1916, the church was abandoned and in need of repair, at which point, Tiffany removed the chapel from St. John, restored it and installed it in a separate building on his estate.
In 1957, a tragic fire destroyed much of Tiffany's estate. The chapel which was contained in a seperate building was not burned, but did fall into disrepair and was threatened with oblivion for a second time.
In 1957, Hugh and Jeannette McKean, director and founder of the Morse, visited the fire-ravaged Tiffany estate, Laurelton Hall on Long Island and acquired architectural elements and leaded-glass windows for the Morse Museum. Two years later they acquired the remains of the Chapel interior and in the years that followed acquired all of its furnishings to keep the chapel in a single collection. The McKeans were dedicated to the chapel’s preservation during a period when there was a lack of interest in Tiffany and understood its historical importance as a work of art that had enjoyed international acclaim and then suffered neglect and abandonment.
Until 1997, many of the chapel elements had remained in packing crates. That year the Charles Hosmer Morse Foundation endorsed the expansion project that made the final resurrection of the Tiffany Chapel possible.
Take a photo tour of the Morse Museum of American Art.
Next page > Laurelton Hall, Tiffany's Long Island Estate
