Renovation work has begun on the house of Rancis Lightfoot Lee, one of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence.
The architectural project is by the studio Machado Silvetti of Boston, the initiative will preserve the remaining parts of the house “Menokin” of 1769.
The special feature is that areas of the house that are now irrecoverable such as walls, floors and missing roof sections will be replaced with glass.

The Georgian villa, built for Lee and his wife in 1769, has remained empty and has been slowly deteriorating since 1960, and is currently unstable, with over 80% of the original material in a state of collapse.

The Menokin Foundation aspires to address the conservation and interpretation of the house in a truly innovative and revolutionary way.
Their philosophy is to stabilize and expose the historical fabric that remains, giving the public a unique understanding of the irreplaceable portions of the artifact, and representing them with a completely different material: glass.

The concept of the project aims to stabilize, preserve and interpret the Menokin House (a National Historical Landmark) and its accessory buildings and landscapes while maintaining their distinctive features and establishing a necessary synergistic relationship between the formal, environmental and structural interdependence between the two.