Luxury Real Estate in Ruins — The $8 Million Gamble in Elkins Park
The mansion stands behind a crumbling stone fence, half-swallowed by weeds.
Columns rise from the front portico like the set of an old opera—grand, rigid, a little worn at the edges.
From Ashbourne Road, Lynnewood Hall still looks imposing. But the closer you get, the more the cracks show.
It was built between 1897 and 1899 for Peter A. B. Widener, one of the richest men in the country.
He made his fortune in railways and streetcars, and his investments helped form the backbone of the U.S. Steel and American Tobacco trusts. He didn’t choose a modest home.
The structure spans 110 rooms and covers more than 70,000 square feet. Horace Trumbauer, who would go on to design the Philadelphia Museum of Art, was only 30 when he took the job.
He worked with the French firm Carlhian et Fils to fill the place with European woodwork, marble, and silk panels.
Most of it was shipped across the Atlantic. Some rooms—like the ballroom—were imported whole.
The final cost came to $8 million at the time.
That number doesn’t hold up in today’s market inflation, but it does explain how a private home ended up with its own power plant, upholstery studio, and room for 1,000 guests.
A fenced garden once stretched across 33 acres, bordered by a limestone wall and dotted with sculptures.
Henri-Léon Gréber designed a large fountain at its center—one of only two of his commissions that survived in the U.S. A gatehouse and smaller lodge called Conklin Hall stood watch near the main drive.
Locals in Elkins Park still call it the last of the American Versailles. For now, it’s empty.
But it remains one of the stranger entries on the list of things to do in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania—a crumbling giant with locked doors and faded curtains.
Gilded Wealth, Sinking Ships — When the Market Crashed into the Family
By the time Lynnewood Hall opened in 1899, the Widener name had weight. Streetcars in cities from Philadelphia to Chicago rode on his profits.
His art hung in rooms bigger than most homes. The house wasn’t only a place to live—it was built to show people what money could buy.
But the family line didn’t hold. In April 1912, his son, George D. Widener, and grandson, Harry, boarded the RMS Titanic in Cherbourg.
Both died when it sank. Only George’s wife survived. Peter A. B. Widener, already sick and growing weaker, never spoke publicly about the loss.
He stayed at Lynnewood Hall and died there three years later, in November 1915.
The estate passed to Joseph Widener, his younger son. By 1916, the gardens had been redesigned in the French style.
Jacques Gréber, who would later design the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, laid out new plans with pools, gravel paths, and topiary walls.
He used his father’s earlier fountain as a centerpiece.
Joseph added greenhouses, kennels, a polo field, and a reservoir. At its peak, the estate employed 100 people—more than some nearby factories.
Starting in 1920, his son Peter began breeding dogs, turning parts of the property into a training ground.
During World War II, the U.S. military used the fields to train service dogs.
The mansion stayed in the family through the early 1940s, but Joseph donated the entire art collection to the National Gallery of Art in 1942.
A year later, in 1943, he sold the southern portion of the estate for housing development.
The main house was put on the market soon after. Offers came in, but few could afford the upkeep—or the scale.
Shifting Ownership — Faith, Default, and Real Estate Drift
In 1952, Lynnewood Hall sold for $192,000 to Faith Theological Seminary. At the time, the sale price equaled around $2.2 million in today’s dollars.
The buyer was a Christian institution led by Carl McIntire, a radio preacher and political organizer who saw the empty mansion as a ready-made campus.
For the next forty years, the seminary trained ministers in rooms once filled with Chinese porcelain and Venetian mirrors.
Classrooms took over the upstairs bedrooms, and chapel services were held in the ballroom.
But money started to run dry in the 1980s. By the time the building was sold again, much of the interior had already been gutted—sold piecemeal to cover debts.
In 1996, the First Korean Church of New York purchased the property in a Sheriff’s Sale.
Ties to the seminary remained, but the group planned to transform the estate into a church and school.
It never worked out.
By 2006, county officials concluded that the property had not been used for religious or educational purposes for almost a decade.
A judge ruled against the church’s claim to tax-exempt status. Meanwhile, pieces kept disappearing. The Gréber fountain was sold at auction, and the gatehouse fell into disrepair and was left to rot.
Dr. Richard S. Yoon, pastor of the First Korean Church, gave an interview in 2012.
He said he planned to relocate the church and end the legal fight, but by then, the property would be difficult to sell.
It needed restoration, permits, and a buyer willing to take on a building that looked like it had stopped breathing sometime in the 1950s.
The Priceless Inventory — Art Exits, Collection Dispersed
Lynnewood Hall held more Western European art than most U.S. museums in the early 20th century.
Between 1915 and 1940, guests could view the collection by appointment from June through October.
People walked through gilded rooms under silk drapes and velvet-lined walls. Persian rugs muted their steps, and carved wood frames towered over them.
The pieces inside weren’t copies or second-tier works. Raphael’s Small Cowper Madonna sat across from Bellini’s Feast of the Gods.
Eight van Dycks, two Vermeers, and fourteen Rembrandts. Bronze sculptures by Donatello.
Portraits by Gainsborough and Reynolds lined the staircase landing. Desiderio da Settignano’s St John the Baptist watched from the far gallery.
Most of it had been bought overseas by Peter A. B. Widener and his son, Joseph.
They worked with dealers in London, Paris, and Milan. The art was meant for Philadelphia, at least at first.
Peter’s original plan was to donate the full collection to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, but that changed.
In 1942, Joseph Widener gave over 2,000 works to the newly opened National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The pieces were boxed up and shipped out.
Within a year, the estate was nearly empty. The hall remained, but its function had shifted. What was once a private museum turned back into a private home.
Nothing was replaced, and no new collection filled the walls. A few rugs and a few chandeliers stayed behind. By the time the southern part of the estate was sold in 1943, most of the rooms were already bare.
Paintings that once cost thousands left without ceremony. Sculptures that crossed oceans were wrapped in crates and disappeared into storage.
Luxury on the Market — $11 Million Tag, No Takers
In May 2019, Lynnewood Hall was listed for $11 million. The property had sat in legal limbo for years, its ownership tangled in tax disputes and stalled rezoning efforts.
Despite the wear, the hall remained one of the largest private homes ever built in Pennsylvania.
Its 33 fenced acres had held their shape. The mansion still looked straight out of a European real estate brochure—if you squinted past the ivy and boarded windows.
A 2014 report from a historical architect estimated the cost of full restoration at $50 million.
The realtor who handled the 2019 listing told clients it could be done for less.
He gave a range of $3 million to $8 million, depending on how much original detail buyers wanted to keep.
A nonprofit stepped in. On July 5, 2022, the Lynnewood Hall Preservation Foundation was announced. Their mission was clear: buy the estate, restore it, and eventually open parts of it to the public.
The foundation secured a purchase agreement by February 8, 2023. The sale closed on June 27 that same year for $9 million.
Crews returned. The foundation said the gardens would become a public park. They planned to restore the structure room by room.
In September 2023, the property hosted its first film crew in decades. The Menzingers, a punk band from Scranton, shot a music video there for their single “Come on Heartache.” It wasn’t a concert.
No audience. Just cameras and the sound of drums echoing through a ballroom that hadn’t seen dancing in 70 years.
The $100 Million Rebuild — Lynnewood Hall’s 2025 Comeback
In the fall of 2023, CBS News aired a feature from the ballroom—still empty, still massive—where restoration crews had begun laying temporary flooring.
The Lynnewood Hall Preservation Foundation, now holding the deed, estimated the full cost of restoration to be $100 million.
Edward Thome, executive director of the foundation, said their goal wasn’t just repair.
He described plans for a public-facing cultural center focused on art, education, and architecture.
In September 2024, Bros of Decay—a YouTube documentary team—released a follow-up film.
They had toured the mansion before the sale. This time, they returned with access to the basement vaults and sealed stairwells.
The film showed rusted light fixtures, pulley-operated windows, and 19th-century mechanical systems designed to run without staff being seen.
That same month, burglars broke in—three times between late September and October.
Police from Cheltenham Township released security footage showing two men in hoodies entering from the direction of Dixon Lane.
They left with small artifacts and caused over $2,000 in damage. The foundation responded by adding motion sensors, new locks, and overnight patrols.