The Met Cloisters
99 Margaret Corbin Drive | also 99 Margaret Corbin Drv | Washington Heights | built 1938
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1922
Rockefeller buys the Unicorn Tapestries, once reportedly used to keep potatoes from freezing
The seven Unicorn Tapestries have a colorful past: for a time the French army reportedly draped them over potatoes to protect the crop from frost. John D. Rockefeller Jr. bought the set in 1922, and six of the hangings stayed in his New York home before reaching the Metropolitan Museum. They now hang in a dedicated room on the Cloisters’ upper floor.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1925
John D. Rockefeller Jr. buys George Grey Barnard's medieval collection
Sculptor George Grey Barnard gathered medieval art and architectural fragments in France between 1905 and 1913 and showed them in his own gallery near Fort Washington from 1914. During one of his recurring money crises he sold the collection in 1925 to John D. Rockefeller Jr., for about $700,000, and stayed on as an adviser. It became the core of the museum later built here.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1930
Rockefeller gives Fort Tryon to the city and keeps four acres for a museum
John D. Rockefeller Jr. had bought the Fort Tryon property, which the city’s landmarks commission notes was the scene of a Revolutionary War battle. In 1930 he handed the land over to New York City, but he held back a four-acre parcel at the northern end of the park. That reserved hilltop became the site of the museum building, which Rockefeller wanted ordinary visitors and scholars alike to enjoy.
- 1931
Architect Charles Collens tells Rockefeller each object must seem part of a composition
Charles Collens, who had already designed Riverside Church for Rockefeller, wrote to his patron in 1931 about what the museum architect would face. Whoever took the job, he said, would have to plan every exhibit so that each piece got the most favorable spot. He wanted each object placed so that it read as part of one composition and not as a showcase specimen, close to the setting it had in its original home.
“…to whom he wrote in 1931: whoever does that building would have to work out all the individual exhibits ... minimize the fact that it was an exhibit…”
- 1934
Architect Charles Collens breaks ground on the new Cloisters
Construction begins in 1934 on Charles Collens's design for the Cloisters, which folds medieval cloister arcades, chapter houses and other architectural fragments gathered from French monasteries into a new building atop Fort Tryon Park. John D. Rockefeller Jr. had bought the Fort Washington hilltop site in 1930 and donated it to the Metropolitan Museum the next year. The building takes five years to complete.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1938
Curator James Rorimer lays out the medieval gardens with help from plant researcher Margaret Freeman
The Cloisters’ three gardens were laid out and planted in 1938, and James Rorimer oversaw their design as the museum went up. He was assisted by Margaret B. Freeman, who researched how plants were kept in the Middle Ages and what they symbolized. Today the plantings hold more than 250 genera of flowers, herbs and trees, tended by horticulturalists who are also historians of medieval gardening.
“They were laid out and planted in 1938 ... The garden's design was overseen by Rorimer ... He was aided by Margaret B. Freeman…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1938
The Metropolitan Museum opens the Cloisters in Fort Tryon Park
Rockefeller bought the museum site in 1930 and gave it to the Metropolitan in 1931. Architect Charles Collens designed a building that incorporates elements of medieval French abbeys, and it opened on May 10, 1938, welcoming the public four days later. In 1933 Rockefeller had also given several hundred acres of Palisades clifftops across the river to keep them from being developed.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1942
The Miracle of Theophilus is staged at the Cloisters, a regular home for medieval theater
Its stone settings, atmosphere and acoustics suit the museum to musical recitals and medieval theater alike. The Miracle of Theophilus was staged there in 1942, and John Gassner’s version of The Second Shepherds’ Play followed in 1954.
“…a regular setting both for musical recitals and as a stage for medieval theater. Notable stagings include The Miracle of Theophilus in 1942…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1947
Curator James Rorimer buys the late Joseph Brummer’s treasures, creating the Cloisters’ Treasury
The dealer Joseph Brummer, a friend of Cloisters curator James Rorimer, died suddenly in 1947. In the months afterward Rorimer bought large quantities of Brummer’s objects, including gold, silver and ivory pieces. A Met scholar later wrote that the sale was the first chance since the late 1920s to add so many liturgical and secular works of such quality, and the pieces ended up in the museum’s Treasury room.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1948
Maya Deren films Meditation on Violence on the ramparts of the Cloisters
One of the more prominent early screen uses of the Cloisters came from the experimental filmmaker Maya Deren. In 1948 she used the museum’s ramparts as the backdrop for her film Meditation on Violence. That same year the German director William Dieterle chose the building as the location for a convent school in Portrait of Jennie.
“…in 1948, when director Maya Deren used its ramparts as a backdrop for her experimental film Meditation on Violence…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1952
Rockefeller gives the Cloisters a large endowment to secure its future
Fourteen years after the museum opened on its Fort Tryon hilltop, John D. Rockefeller Jr. made a further gift: in 1952 he endowed the Cloisters with a large grant meant to ensure it would last. The museum had opened in May 1938 with collections far larger than the Barnard holdings it began with. The landmarks commission cites the endowment in its 1974 report on the building.
“…in 1952 Rockefeller endowed The Cloisters with a large grant to assure its…”
- 1956
The museum acquires the Merode Altarpiece
In 1956, the Cloisters acquires the Merode Altarpiece, a small Netherlandish triptych of the Annunciation painted around 1427 by Robert Campin. It becomes one of the museum's best-known works, its intimate domestic setting a foundational scene in early Netherlandish painting. The acquisition builds on the core of European sculpture and stonework that Rockefeller and sculptor George Grey Barnard had assembled decades earlier.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1961
The Fuentidueña Apse goes on view after three decades in storage
The apse of a Romanesque church at Fuentidueña in Segovia, Spain, built around 1175 to 1200, arrived in New York in 1931 but was not shown to the public until 1961, when it was installed at the Cloisters. The museum was designated a New York City landmark in 1974.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1973
Met director Thomas Hoving tells landmark hearing that air pollution is eroding the Fuentidueña apse
At the Landmarks Commission hearing on the Cloisters, Metropolitan director Thomas Hoving backed designation but raised two problems. Air pollution was wearing away the stone of the Fuentidueña apse, and the museum had already built a temporary cover around it. Studies had found no cure, so he said a glass structure might be needed, which he thought better than losing the stone. He also hoped to swap the 1938 Gothic chapel for a genuine medieval one.
“…because of air pollution, the Museum was forced to put up a temporary surrounding structure in order to preserve the stones of the Fuentiduena Apse…”
- 1974
The Landmarks Preservation Commission designates the Cloisters a city landmark
In March 1974 the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the Cloisters an individual landmark, along with the land it stands on. Its report credits architect Charles Collens with a design that blends well with the medieval pieces built into it, and praises the hilltop site above the Hudson, which suits medieval precedent. The report also names the five French monasteries that gave the museum its name.
“…the Landmarks Preservation Commission designates as a Landmark The Cloisters, Fort Tryon Park, Borough of Manhattan…”
- 1999
The galleries for the seven Unicorn Tapestries are refurbished
The Met reports that the galleries holding the seven Unicorn Tapestries were refurbished in 1999. The hangings are among the works Rockefeller gave from his own collection when the Cloisters was assembled. He also supplied the building, the grounds and an endowment for operations and future acquisitions, so the tapestries became a centerpiece of the museum he financed.
Source: Internet Archive
- 2006
The Treasury reopens after a two-year renovation
The Cloisters’ Treasury, a small gallery of precious objects, reopened in 2006 after two years of renovation. It had been built in 1988 to mark the museum’s 50th anniversary and holds luxury objects acquired after the 1938 founding. The Met described it as part of a larger project that also gave the Saint-Guilhem Cloister a new skylight in 2003 and new lighting and climate controls in every gallery.
Source: Internet Archive
- 2011
The Cloisters buys The Falcon’s Bath, a newly discovered tapestry from about 1400
In 2011 the museum bought The Falcon’s Bath, a recently discovered tapestry woven in the Southern Netherlands around 1400 to 1415. Wikipedia describes it as exceptional in quality and among the best-preserved surviving tapestries of its type. The purchase fits the Cloisters’ approach of adding secular works that show everyday medieval life alongside its religious art.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2021
Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story sends Tony and Maria on a date to the Cloisters
In Steven Spielberg’s 2021 film of West Side Story, Maria, played by Rachel Zegler, and Tony, played by Ansel Elgort, go to the Cloisters on a date. Earlier screen appearances include Maya Deren’s 1948 experimental film and a scenic motorcycle chase along the site’s paths in the 1968 film Coogan’s Bluff.
“In the 2021 Steven Spielberg film West Side Story, Maria (Rachel Zegler) and Tony (Ansel Elgort) go to the Cloisters on a date.”
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- The CloistersWikipedia
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