Documentation of a telescope house and milk house constructed in the early 18th century

Wye Landing Memory Houses by Robert Hutchison Robert Hutchison’s Memory Houses is a speculative project that investigates mortality and memory through the lens of architecture. Situated along the banks of the Wye River on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, architectural typologies such as dwelling, chapel, lighthouse, and memorial weave together spatial narrative about loss and recollection. Distant as well as more recent architectural memories make cameo appearances in the Memory Houses: the stave churches of Norway and the Great Mosque of Córdoba that Hutchison experienced as a child; the lighthouses of the Chesapeake Bay; the timber grain elevators of the Palouse; the Colosseum and the Santo Stefano Rotondo in Rome. The project was significantly impacted by Hutchison’s experiences while a Rome Prize Fellow at the American Academy in Rome from January through July 2017.

One of the nine projects that make up the Memory Houses, the Telescope House is strategically sited at the highest point in Talbot County MD, overlooking the Wye River that leads to the Chesapeake Bay.

“On a hill overlooking Wye Landing is a handsome brick telescopic house. It is called by various names, including the present name of "Wye Landing Farm", "King Hayes Farm", "Indian Hill", etc … It is composed of three brick portions on a northeast/southwest axis, with the main gable facing the Wye River at its juncture with Skipton Creek and Wye Narrows. The latter gable is two rooms deep and each room has two windows flanking its fireplace, a total of ten windows plus four basement windows. This is an instance where the designer of an early house was conscious of a superb view … Behind the small wing stands a brick milkhouse with very wide overhang.”

- Maryland Historical Trust Inventory Form for State Historic Sites Survey, 1977

Design: Unknown
Drawings: Sharon Fung, Marika Meinen, Hillary Pritchett
Models: Xiaoxi Jiao, Jackie Hensy
B&W Photograph: Courtesy of Maryland Historic Trust
Location: Wye Mills, MD
First phase of Telescope House & Milk House constructed approximately 1700; second & third phase of Telescope House constructed 19th century.