Georgia O’Keeffe's Ghost Ranch

Many of you must have heard of artist Georgia O’Keeffe. Born near Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, she was a major figure in American art from the 1920s. She is chiefly known for paintings of flowers, rocks, shells, animal bones, and landscapes.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />T</span>he artist’s house at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico is where she spent each summer and fall of most of the last 40 years of her long and prolific life. (She died in 1986 at the age of 98.). Some years ago it was restored to its original 1940s appearance, based on photographs from the period.<br />Adobe fireplaces and walls, and the viga-and-latilla ceilings typical of New Mexican adobe-style architecture, endow the house with a welcoming, earthy intimacy.<br /><br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl02_okeefe.jpg" style="width: 450px; height: 586px;" /><br />“To me it is the best place in the world,” O’Keeffe (at 94) said of Ghost Ranch. “It has always been secluded and solitary. When I first went there, it was only one house with one room—which had a ghost living in it.”<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl01_okeefe.jpg" style="width: 451px; height: 588px;" /><br />O’Keeffe would climb the ladder to the roof, where she often slept.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl06_okeefe.jpg" /><br />The kitchen and breakfast room feature viga-and-latilla ceilings and windows that open onto the high-desert landscape.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl04_okeefe.jpg" style="width: 451px; height: 587px;" /><br />As elsewhere in the house, rocks, shells and bones collected by the artist on her walks line shelves in the dining room. Chinese chairs surround the plain plywood table. The simple, U-shaped adobe structure was built in the 1930s; it now sits on approximately 12 acres.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl07_okeefe.jpg" /><br />From the breakfast room, O’Keeffe could look north to the pump house.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl08_okeefe.jpg" /><br />Her <em>Untitled (Red and Yellow Cliffs)</em> dates from 1940, the year she bought the property. It pictures the view from her window.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl10_okeefe.jpg" /><br />The studio at Ghost Ranch remained an austere space with few furnishings. “I thought the ranch would be good for me because nothing can grow here and I wouldn’t be able to use up my time gardening,” she said.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl12_okeefe.jpg" /><br />The Le Corbusier–style lounge chair in the studio is original to the house.<br /><br /><img alt="" src="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/images/homes/2002/03/okeefe/hosl11_okeefe.jpg" /><br />The house, with Cerro Pedernal in the distance.<br /><br /><br /> <div class="byline"> <div class="contributors"> <span class="c"><span>Text by </span>Dana Micucci</span>/<span class="c"><span>Photography by </span>Ro</span><span class="c">bert Reck</span> </div> </div><br />All images and information from <a href="http://www.architecturaldigest.com/">Architectural Digest</a>.

Georgia O’Keeffe's Ghost Ranch

Many of you must have heard of artist Georgia O’Keeffe. Born near Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, she was a major figure in American art from the 1...

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