Gatekeeper: World of Folly

The Colonel Louis Watres Armory, built in 1900 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is Slonem’s latest project that showcases the artist’s novel take on interior design—matching vibrant, multicolor interiors with a bricolage of historically potent and rare items found from around the world. This system of “collectorating,” or collecting and decorating, has become Slonem’s trademark and can be found across the artist’s multiple historical properties around the country. Through the course of its century-old lifetime the 102,000-square-foot space has served not only as an armory, but a performance hall for Russian composer and pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff, a whistle-stop for campaigning presidents, and even briefly as a clinic. Gatekeeper: World of Folly walks readers through this masterpiece room-by room, object by object, filling us with the sense of wonder for which the artist is so well known.