Mesmerizing and Masterful Miniatures: History and Treatment of Snuff Bottles

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FROM ISABELLA’S MUSIC ROOM TO SYMPHONY HALL: COMPOSER MARGARET RUTHVEN LANG

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Technical Study of an 11th-12th Century Guanyin Sculpture

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Correspondence from Cochin the Cat

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Connecting Cultural Worlds: An Embroidery from India Celebrating Portugal’s Monarchy

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Visions of Agapanthus

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From A Little Spark May Burst A Flame: Ackroyd & Harvey’s ‘Script’

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Secrets of the Gardner Museum Collection’s Furniture

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Musician Roland Hayes’ 80th Birthday Celebration

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Botticelli’s Virgin and Child: Infrared and Ultraviolet Light Imaging

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Isabella and the Complexities of Mother’s Day

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“Spain Says It All:” Isabella Stewart Gardner’s Travel Albums

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Treasure Chest: Isabella’s Gilt Vitrine

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Deceptive Intimacy: Isabella Stewart Gardner’s 1883 Japan Travel Albums

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Leafing Through Isabella’s Travel Album: Spain and Portugal, Volume II, 1888

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Saint Christopher: World's Best Travel Companion

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Betye Saar & The Gardner Museum: A Long-Standing Relationship

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The Orchid Habit: Under the Spell of the Cymbidium

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Making Reproductions of Two Hanging Scroll Paintings at the Gardner Museum

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Mirrors with a Memory: The Gardner Family Daguerreotypes

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Francesco Pesellino’s Painting and Men’s Fashion in the Italian Renaissance

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Open House: How Isabella’s Home Exhibition Funded Trailblazing Cotting School

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The Misattributed Ballerina: Louis Kronberg or Edgar Degas?

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In the Soldier’s Service: Mary Dexter, Isabella Stewart Gardner, and Caring for the Soldiers of WWI

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Isabella’s Reliquary of Friendship: Her Bond with Okakura Kakuzō

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Isabella Stewart Gardner and Simone Martini

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The Medusa Mosaic in the Courtyard

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Isabella’s Delightful Stone Fruit Baskets

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Isabella Stewart Gardner, the American West, and Central America

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Lady Augusta Gregory: One of Isabella’s Pen Pals

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The History of Labor Day and the Laborers Who Built the Gardner Museum

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Revealing the Layers of European Painted Wood Sculptures Using XRF Technology

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Isabella’s Children's Books: From the Babes in the Wood to Doctor Dolittle

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Relics of an Emperor: Napoleon Bonaparte in the Gardner Museum

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John Singer Sargent, Isabella Stewart Gardner, and Spain

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The Promise of the Chimney Bellflower

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Inside the French Authors Case: Alexandre Dumas

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Isabella’s Spiritual Life Revealed

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How The Magic Flute Inspired Maurice Sendak and Isabella Stewart Gardner

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The Secrets Revealed by the Long Gallery Stools’ Conservation

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Une Femme Bibliophile: Isabella’s Book of Hours by Bourdichon

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The Story of Bus Park: How Isabella’s Children’s Books Fueled Nari Ward’s Imagination

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Isabella’s Bookworm Friendship with Vernon Lee

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Isabella's Desk of Curiosities in the Macknight Room

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Restoring A Portrait by Andreas Martin Andersen

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The Overlooked Female Photographer, Clover Adams

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Isabella and Okakura Kakuzō’s Impactful Friendship

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A Rare and Unique Turkish Tile

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Isabella Stewart Gardner and Her Horses

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The Story Behind Isabella’s Venetian Campanile Cup

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Remembering Isabella: Her Yearly Memorial Service

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Conserving the Works on Paper of the Short Gallery

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The Elevation of the Nasturtium: From Plate To Palace Garden

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Ethel Smyth: Composer and Activist

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The Five Frames Left Behind

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Women on Display: Elizabeth Wentworth Roberts

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The Story Behind Porsha Olayiwola’s Poetry

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Beger Sølv- The Gardner’s Hanseatic Beaker

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Visiting Fenway Court in the Days of Isabella

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Those Who Come Before Us Help Make Us Who We Are

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Francesco Torbido and the Diversity of 16th century Venice

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Isabella’s Lace

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Forever is a Long Time

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The New Wing a Decade Later

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Ovid, Titian, and the Depiction of Violence Against Women

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Inside the Collection Blog

Dig deeper into our collections with our most recent stories.

  • A shelf in a historic gilded, glass-door, cabinet with snuff bottles in the Little Salon of the Gardner Museum.

    Mesmerizing and Masterful Miniatures: History and Treatment of Snuff Bottles

    Our conservation staff recently examined some of the Museum’s most overlooked objects, Isabella’s diverse collection of ornate snuff bottles. Keep reading to learn more about the history of snuff bottles and their conservation treatment.
  • A printed list of musical works by Edwin A. Jones, Clayton Johns, J. Phippen, E.A. MacDowell, H.W. Parker, and the Kneisel Quartette, with signatures of the composers and handwritten bars of music.

    FROM ISABELLA’S MUSIC ROOM TO SYMPHONY HALL: COMPOSER MARGARET RUTHVEN LANG

    Isabella formed a close bond with Boston-born composer Margaret Ruthven Lang, and was an early supporter of her work. Learn more about their relationship and Margaret’s legacy here.
  • The Guanyin sculpture lays on the CT scanning bed inside the machine while medical staff tests the positioning with a laser alignment system.

    Technical Study of an 11th-12th Century Guanyin Sculpture

    Our conservation department recently completed a technical analysis of the collection’s Guanyin sculpture, using a variety of imaging techniques. Learn more about the study & the results!
  • Handwritten letter to Isabella Stewart Gardner with red Japanese text and black English text.

    Correspondence from Cochin the Cat

    To celebrate International Cat Day, we examine Isabella’s charming relationship with Okakura Kakuzo, and a treasured gift of a kitten.
  • A detail of an embroidered wall hanging in the Gardner Museum of cream colored thread on a dark blue background. Three men in 17th century European dress are surrounded by a wall. On the outside of the wall are sheep, ducks, and vegetation.

    Connecting Cultural Worlds: An Embroidery from India Celebrating Portugal’s Monarchy

    In the 16th century, Bengali commercial agents and textile workshops collaborated with Portuguese clients and merchants to produce embroidered ‘colchas,’ a popular luxury good. A few centuries later, Isabella purchased one for her collection.
  • Photo of flowers in a courtyard.

    Visions of Agapanthus

    A view into the arcane history of the lily of the Nile, a feature of the Summer Blues display in the Museum’s Courtyard.
  • The text from Dante’s Canto IV in green in a square of grass from Ackroyd & Harvey’s ‘Script’.

    From A Little Spark May Burst A Flame: Ackroyd & Harvey’s ‘Script’

    After their residency at the Gardner, artists-activists Ackroyd & Harvey used a passage from Dante’s Inferno to create a new work in an unconventional medium; grass. Learn more about the piece they grew, titled ‘Script’.
  • Dark brown desk with seven drawers, three on each side and one in the middle, and edge detailing that resembles pine needles in the Gardner Museum’s Blue Room

    Secrets of the Gardner Museum Collection’s Furniture

    While eyes are often drawn to the collections paintings and sculptures, there is a wealth of history contained in its furniture. Learn more about a few of the pieces to notice on your next trip to the Gardner!
  • Musician sitting at piano.

    Musician Roland Hayes’ 80th Birthday Celebration

    Hayes’ 80th Birthday at the Gardner was a celebration of the incredible life & career of a trailblazer in the Boston music scene. Learn more about the lasting legacy of a Bostonian music icon.