The 2025 Modern House Day Tour + Symposium is on October 18.
The biannual Modern House Day Tour + Symposium, organized by the New Canaan Museum + Historical Society, has been a favorite event of architects, designers, students, and fans of all things mid-century.
The 2025 tour features mid century modern houses designed by Philip Johnson, John Johansen, and Bimel Kehm, as well as a 2025 newly-built home that expands on mid-century principles with its use of innovative materials, clean lines, open floor plan, and strong connection to nature. Attendees will travel on small, comfortable buses, and learn from architects with a deep knowledge of, and appreciation for, this seminal period in architectural history.
This year’s symposium, organized and moderated by New Canaan resident and designer Jackie Shapiro, examines the evolution of mid-century modernism’s spirit and expressions of optimism, and how its momentum continues into contemporary times and beyond.
Is mid-century modernism a nostalgic trend or is its spirit of optimism alive in today’s design? As we push further into the 2020s, bold aesthetic distinctions are overtaking brand-driven design, and a renewed sense of hope is shaping contemporary creativity. Today’s designers aren’t just reviving the past – they’re reinterpreting it with optimism, upcycling materials, and transforming dead spaces into vibrant, livable environments. Does this movement echo the postwar ambition of mid-century modernism, or are we witnessing a "neutro" (new + retro) aesthetic that transcends history? The MHD Symposium explores these themes. The symposium will take place in Morrill Hall at St. Markʼs Episcopal Church, designed in 1959-61 by Sherwood, Mills & Smith.
Modern House Day 2025 Symposium Panelists
Moderator
Founder of French Bull, a vibrant, modern melamine tableware brand, Shapiro launched her design career in Milan at pop culture fashion label Fiorucci, Ms. Shapiro's expertise brings a dynamic, trend-forward perspective to any design discussion.
Architect
Founding partner and principal at the award-winning firm GOA, Ms. Gray is committed to regenerative construction techniques and community engagement, producing buildings known for their site-sensitivity, innovative construction, environmental performance and design excellence.
Journalist
An award-winning features reporter with The New York Times, Kodé covers the intersection of culture and real estate. She is also an adjunct professor at New York University and the author of Unseen Places, a forthcoming book about observation.
Custom Builder
Since joining Prutting + Company Custom Builders over a decade ago, Cronly has led the construction of award-winning modern homes as well as renovations of significant midcentury works, with a focus on ensuring that each building’s performance and comfort match its architectural excellence.
The History of Modern House Day
The first Modern House Day was May 14, 1949. The architect Eliot Noyes chaired the committee that organized the event and the $2000 raised benefitted the New Canaan Library. The tour featured homes built between 1947 and 1949 – The Noyes House, The Gores House, The Kniffin House designed by the architects Marcel Breuer and Eliot Noyes, The Breuer House, The Glass House and The Rantoul House designed by Sherwood, Mills & Smith. The idea was to showcase these fabulous new modern homes. Following the success of the inaugural tour, members of the New Canaan Community Nursery School ran Modern House Days from 1952 through 1967, and included homes built during those years by many of the originally featured architects.
The Modern House Day was resurrected as the Modern House Day Tour + Symposium by the New Canaan Historical Society in 2001. By that time, mid-century modern homes were being demolished to make way for larger houses that some considered better suited to the needs of families. The Historical Society’s focus was to educate the public about the importance of these mid-century architectural gems. The first symposium featured the architects Richard Bergmann and John Johansen, the furniture designer Jens Risom and David Borglum of the builders Borglum & Meek. The public caught on, and in the years that followed, numerous mid-century moderns slated for demolition were purchased and restored.
The tradition of the biennial Modern House Day Tour + Symposium continues under the direction of the New Canaan Museum & Historical Society. Past symposiums featured Toshiko Mori, John Morris Dixon, Hilary Lewis, Fred Noyes, Stone Hicks, Sean Anderson, Michael Webb, Nader Tehrani and more.