What a year! Thank you to all the event attendees, tour takers, Biergarten visitors, and program partners who shaped 2025 at the Heurich House Museum. We’re looking forward to another year with you and the building that makes it all possible.

What’s the Heurich House without a house? And what’s a house that you can’t get around? We're working to replace the house’s elevator, as the current one dates from 1987 and has been out of service multiple times this year. This has stopped people from attending tours, programs, and getting inside.

What’s the Heurich House without a house? And what’s a house without a roof? We are working to replace the roof systems on the historic mansion and carriage house. Without a secure roof protecting the rest of the building, everything we do at the Museum is in jeopardy.

But really the best archive story belongs to @heurichhouse.bsky.social

What’s the Heurich House without a house? And what’s a house that you can’t keep warm?

What’s the Heurich House without a house? And what’s a house without windows? 🪟 We are working to restore the house’s 135 historic windows because they are drafty and let in moisture, increasing the risk of damage to the building structure and historic objects inside.

What’s the Heurich House without a house? The Heurich House Museum building is our most important artifact.

This weekend, get in the holiday spirit and explore dozens of local makers at @heurichhouse.bsky.social's Christmas Markt (we’re proud to be a sponsor!) And just down the street from the DC History Center, discover even more at the DowntownDC Holiday Market.

Happy #GivingTuesday! Today, we’re asking for your help to raise $2500 so that we can continue preserving the Heurich House building, our most important artifact.

How many people contribute to your dinner experiences today? Who works behind the scenes to make it all possible? The work of artisans and craftspeople made the Heurich family’s Thanksgiving experience - and all family dinners - possible.

Hayward & Hutchinson - located at 424 19th St NW - tiled the floor in the conservatory of Christian and Mathilde’s first home just a few blocks away from H&H at 1218 19th St NW in 1889. They also supplied Italian marble saddles, or thresholds. (1/8)

In 1888, the Heurich family’s farm, named “Bellvue,” in Price George’s Country Maryland went through a series of renovations led by architect J.G. Meyers (the same architect that designed the Heurich House we know today and renovated the first Heurich family home on 19th St NW). (1/6)

During Christmas Markt, the Museum only works with “Beginner” and “Intermediate” maker businesses to help give them the best opportunities to have a successful year.

Give the gift of a year of community this holiday season! A Heurich House Museum gift membership won’t sit in the corner collecting dust. It’s perfect for...

🏠 1218 19th St NW: Christian & Mathilde Heurich’s first home together Christian and Mathilde married in 1887 and lived in a house on 19th St NW, directly behind the original Chr. Heurich Brewing Co. (1/6)

Museum Members 🤝 Maker Fellows Last month, the two makers (Abloom & D'bohomama) in our pilot fellowship program presented some new products and booth set-ups to a test audience of our members.

To make the main hallway fireplace mantel: 🔨 Carpenters and joiners would have framed it 🗜️ Cabinet makers specialized at making detailed wooden furniture, would have hand crafted the mantel (1/5)

On Veteran’s Day, we remember people who worked for the Heurich family and served in the military. There were likely many more people who served whose names we don’t know - including the craftspeople and artisans whose stories we’re currently researching.

Each part of the Heurich home represents multiple layers of labor - how do we uncover them?

We’re proud to share that our Humanities Scholar-in-Residence, Neil Flanagan (@jgbollard.bsky.social), has published a new piece in @theatlantic.com: “White House Architecture Was an Honor System. Trump Noticed.” (1/3)

One of the first things people see after walking through the front doors of the Heurich house is a grand built-in fireplace. The hallway was designed to make a powerful impression. Its height, the detailed woodwork, large mirror, and intricate tiling adds to the sense of wealth and grandeur. 1/4

The bronze sculpture may be just one piece in the Heurich house, but its presence in the Reception Room speaks volumes. The room was originally meant to be a library - the ceiling decorated with different areas of study and busts of prominent men in Western tradition, like philosophers and writers.

Celebrate the power of small, local organizations with us at Hook Hall this Wednesday, November 5th from 6:00-8:30pm! 🫶 We're thrilled to be part of Spur Local's annual celebration of local social action alongside our peer nonprofits.

“[Grandmother] heard knocking in the bronze figure…in the corner of the reception room.” - Jan Evans, a Heurich grandchild, recalled in a 1985 oral history interview. After the knocks, Amelia heard Jan’s father say, “things are so different from what I thought” – even though he died during WWII.

“Grandmother believed in spirits” - Jan Evans, Heurich granddaughter. Amelia Heurich often asked for good spirits to be with her family in her diaries. She would also attribute sounds like knocks or rustling in the house to Anna Marguerite, her daughter who died at 9 months old.

If you drink it and walk the distance from from Heurich house to the Kennedy Center every day, you’ll live to be 102 per Christian Heurich himself.

Käthe Kruse (born in 1883 in Germany) founded her dollmaking practice on the idea that dolls should be soft, durable, and more natural for children to use. This meant departing from the cold, hard (likely inaccessible to many) porcelain dolls of the era. 👶 (1/6) 🗃️

“Oh yes we always had Michael…Grandmother was very superstitious!” - Heurich granddaughter Jan Evans recalled about Michael…the doll. 🫢

The skylight was designed with ventilation in mind. 🌬️ When walking up the main staircase, your eyes may be drawn to faint light shining from a skylight above. The skylight room is between the main stairs and the roof - only accessible through a 4th floor closet. ✨

How do relationships affect the way people are remembered? After doing research, we’ve learned that the Heurich and Gichner families were actually close friends. The Gichner family business installed the new turret roof in the 1930s.

Just TWO WEEKS Left to get Early Bird Tickets! 🎟️🎄 Don’t miss your chance for reduced priced tickets for the 14th annual Heurich Christmas Markt — DC’s only multi-day holiday market spotlighting all local makers!

How do people make connections and support one another? There are many parallels between the Heurich and Gichner families’ stories. (In the 1930s Lawrence Gichner, son to Ernest, replaced the turret’s roof with copper plates.)

The Heurich family built their home - where the Museum stands today - on the ancestral lands of the Nacotchtank (Anacostan) and Piscataway peoples. The Heurich House Museum acknowledges the Indigenous labor and care that have shaped these lands for generations.

Lawrence Gichner (who replaced the turret roof) was born in DC in 1907 to Ernest and Helen Gichner. His father apprenticed in metalwork in Vienna, Austria starting at 14 years old. He immigrated to the U.S. in 1888 and opened a DC shop DC with the slogan: “everything in sheet metal.” (1/5) 🗃️

Imagine it’s 1987: You step inside the Heurich mansion, which looks like a time capsule to the 1890s. The halls are lively and filled with chatter - 60 guests mingle to celebrate the 50th birthday of Don King, one of the Heurich grandchildren. (1/4) 🗃️

Contractor James T. Kenyon and architect Appleton P. Clark Jr. led the Conservatory roof replacement. 👷 (1/6) 🗃️

Last chance to Get Crafty this year! 🎨✨ Join us as we paint river rocks — take yours home or add it to our rock garden around the firepits. Leave your mark and get creative before the season ends! 📅 Wed Oct 15 | 6-8pm 📍 1921 Biergarten @ Heurich House 🎟️ FREE: events.humanitix.com/get-crafty-n...

The permit specified: “remove the…glass roof to [the] conservatory and replace [it] with wood construction.” On May 16, 1923, the Heurich family began the process, costing $2,000 - over $38,300 today, to install a new tile and tin mansard roof with a coffered oak ceiling. (1/6) 🗃️

Step into the Conservatory on a sunlit day. Golden light streams through the glass, filling the space with warmth. After wandering the hushed, shadowed rooms of the mansion, the sudden brilliance is dazzling — so radiant it takes a moment for your eyes to catch up. ☀️ (1/4) 🗃️

🏗️ From the Heurich Brewery to today’s job sites. Did you know the Heurich family often hired German immigrants – as brewery workers, artisans, and even household staff – to build both their business and their home?

Workshop (Builders #1) https://www.wikiart.org/en/jacob-lawrence/workshop-builders-1-1972

➡️ Our research mission: find subcontractors that Heurich mansion architect John Granville Meyers typically worked with. ➡️ Our hope: Identify some DC-based manufacturers in the late 19th century. (1/4)🗃️

Step inside the Museum during Dupont Circle’s First Friday ArtWalk next Friday, October 3rd from 6-8pm and explore the first floor of this historic home AND explore intricate scale models of local and federal landmarks from artist Elliot Carter, a lifelong Washingtonian.

12 million people immigrated to the U.S. between 1860-1900, many seeking job opportunities. Though the large businesses and the factory system were growing, subcontracting brought together an intricate network of competing small-scale manufacturers. (1/4)🗃️

1870: 3.5 million industrial workers in the U.S. 1910: 14 million industrial workers in the U.S. Labor Historian David Montgomery noted that around the turn of the 20th century “[p]refabrication of molding, doors...other building parts was concentrated in large planing and rolling mills” (1/4)🗃️

What does your home reveal? Does it match how you want to be seen? What stays, and what goes? (1/4) 🗃️

What do Washington, Shakespeare, Dante, Goethe, Longfellow, Schiller, Von Humboldt, Homer, and Raphael have in common? They’re all men. And - according to whoever chose them - all distinguished (at least in Western tradition)

Happy 183rd Cristian Heurich! 🍺🎂 📸 Amelia Heurich's Diary from Sunday, September 12, 1915. Heurich House Museum collection.

🍻 History & Hops: Heurich Revival Edition is ONE WEEK AWAY on Thursday, September 18th from 6–8pm! Step back into DC’s brewing past and raise a glass to the revival of three historic Chr. Heurich Brewing Co. beers! ✨

A moment for the mosaics: tomorrow at our monthly Get Crafty! Join us from 5-7pm in the Biergarten and craft your own paper mosaics inspired by the floors in the historic home (built 1892-94). 💠✂️