Through an Uncommon Lens: The Life and Photography of F. Holland Day

8. The Chalet

• 161 • eight The Chalet ∂¥ In April 1910, within a month of his father’s death, Fred Day, aged forty- five, documented the blast of rock that initiated the transformation of his Five Islands, Maine, coastal property. By the time it was completed some three years later, a pier, pergola, and chalet-styled house had emerged between a gentle rise of land and the jagged cliffs overlooking the water. The pier was the essential first stage of the conversion. According to Day’s handwritten account, the cornerstone at the pier was officially laid on the Fourth of July 1910“by Elisha Field who with the assistance of his son William and Theodore Thibideaux, all of Georgetown, have been at work on the construction of the pier since April.”1 Field, along with his wife Violetta, was a native of Maine. He was a fisherman by trade but also worked the land and made a living doing various jobs, including masonry, carpentry, and caretaking for summer residents in the Five Islands area. The Fields became very close to Day and remained caretakers of the Chalet as long as Day owned it.2 Thibideaux, who is pictured in Maine scrapbooks and Day portraits, was a farmhand when Day first met him and held a succession of laboring positions, including working alongside Field during the building of the Chalet.3 162 • chapter eight Once the pier was completed, barges carrying all manner of construction materials —lumber, roof tiles, tools, concrete molds, windows, braces—and, later, furniture began to arrive. The pergola, which seemed to cling precariously to the cliff ’s edge and had a wonderfully dramatic view of the harbor and open water beyond, was erected in the autumn of 1911. In December that year, Day finalized plans with architect Louis Chapell Newhall,who wrote that although Swiss-style chalets were rare in America, “I have made an extended study of that form of building in Switzerland and my knowledge is at your disposal.”4 Guiney’s former house was moved as the excavation and framing of the Chalet began in early 1912, and the building progressed rapidly (figure 59). Day, who was in Norwood because his mother had taken sick,5 received a running commentary on its progress throughout the month of July from Clarence White’s young son Maynard. On the first of the month the sixteen-year-old reported that“the living room, kitchen and your room now have the second flooring . All the partitions are up on the lower floor too. The stairs are completed up to the attic and Mr. Fields [sic] is working on the hearth in the livingroom.” The youth also began to take photographs of the construction. By July 20, “all the floors and partitions are up on all the floors. The windows are in the attic and most of them are in on the second floor. . . . Some of the doors are up inside the house and they are putting up some doors that lead out on the balconies.” Five days later the craftsmen boarded up the windows to await Day’s arrival, having completed all the work they could without his input.6 Shortly thereafter, Day traveled to the site in time to oversee the finishing touches to the mammoth three-story structure of timber and stucco with heavy wooden brackets supporting broad overhanging eaves. Although the top floor was primarily open space fitted for use as storage, an overflow of guests could be accommodated there as well. On the second floor there was an“enormous central hall-room,” which became“a favorite place for taking group portraits,” and a large sitting room with banks of windows and a fireplace, Day’s favorite retreat whenever he stayed in the house late into the fall. The remainder of the second floor had a congenial dormitory-like ambiance, as it was given over to numerous bedrooms , each painted its own separate color and outfitted with a bed, side table, candle, and tiny flashlight. All the rooms opened onto balconies “where guests could enjoy sun bathing in fair weather; in stormy weather promenades, since they were adequately sheltered.”7 figure 59. In 1910, Day moved the old house he called“Castle Guiney,” visible at the left behind the workmen’s shed, to make room for the Chalet, seen under construction at far right. A boat tied up to the pier is in...