Miniatures Monday: Chicago Thorne Rooms to Get Christmas Decor for First Time - See Thorne Rooms Postcard Exhibit

For the first time, staff members at Chicago's Art Institute are decorating six of the 68 miniature Thorne rooms for Christmas, part of a new holiday celebration that is expected to be continued in coming years. This year’s rooms feature historically appropriate Christmas accessories such as an authentic Christmas tree in the English Victorian Drawing Room, as well as Chinese New Year and Hanukkah decorations.

Thorne Rooms Video

The rooms, commissioned by Mrs. James Ward Thorne, were first exhibited in the 1933 Chicago's Century of Progress Expositiona. Thirty-seven of the rooms were donated to the Art Institute in 1942.

See story and photos here.

** Compare the Thorne rooms from original 1940s postcards and recent photos exhibited by the Chicago Postcard Museum.


Image: The West Parlor 1758-1787 Mount Vernon, Fairfax County, Virginia Chicago Postcard Museum.