Treasures of Bellefontaine

Decorative Arts Exhibit on Second Floor at Ventfort Hall

Bellefontaine, a neighboring estate to Ventfort Hall, was one of Lenox’s most lavish and storied country houses. It was built in 1898, five years after Ventfort Hall, by Giraud Foster, a shipping scion and Jeanne Van Nest, an heiress of a harness and saddler fortune. Today the house and grounds are owned by Canyon Ranch.

“Treasures of Bellefontaine,” on loan from Giraud Foster’s granddaughter, Jane Foster of Palm Beach, conveys the level of elegance in Lenox’s gilded age dining rooms.

Exquisite Royal Worcester china, gilded Venetian glass, American and European silver all were set at Bellefontaine’s vast dining table by head butler Auguste Chollet and his staff. The Foster dining table is recreated in the exhibit at Ventfort Hall.