Article Text
Perched on a terraced hill just north of Huntley Meadows Park, Historic Huntley has commanded attention for two centuries. The cream-colored brick villa combines refined Federal-period architecture with the complicated history of the plantation it once overlooked.
Thomson Francis Mason, an Alexandria mayor and grandson of George Mason IV of Gunston Hall, built the 11-room country retreat around 1825. He called it “Huntly,” likely after his family’s ancestral home in Scotland.
Although historians classify Huntley as a secondary home rather than a primary residence, experts consider its design unusually sophisticated. Mason’s main residence was Colross on Oronoco Street in Alexandria. Traveling by horse to Huntley probably took about 90 minutes, giving him a quiet escape from the busy port city and his public responsibilities.
The three-level house was also designed for comfort. Its main entry room has doors opening north and south, while every main-floor room has an exterior door. That arrangement may have acted as an early cooling system by capturing breezes across the hilltop.
Celebrating Two Centuries
To mark the 200th anniversary of the villa’s construction, the Friends of Historic Huntley and the Fairfax County Park Authority held Art and Architecture Day on April 5. Eight artists produced paintings and sketches while volunteers led tours for about 60 visitors.
The Park Authority acquired the house and 2.8 acres in 1986. A restoration completed in 2012 removed alterations made after the Mason family’s ownership.
The surviving complex includes the villa, a brick “necessary,” a root cellar, an icehouse, a spring house and a tenant house. The necessary, an unusually large four-seat privy, is flanked by two rooms with diamond-shaped vents. Volunteer J.G. Harrington said those rooms may have served as smokehouses.
During the 1800s, Huntley overlooked Hunting Creek Farm, a roughly 2,000-acre plantation where enslaved people cultivated oats, wheat, corn, hay, clover and other crops. The view south now stretches across Huntley Meadows Park.
Franconia Supervisor Rodney Lusk, who visited April 4, said preserving the property is important because it is among Fairfax County’s oldest historic structures. He also praised research that places the enslaved people who worked there within the site’s history.
An Unusually Refined Country House
Historic Huntley reflects the symmetry associated with Federal-period architecture, a style often linked to the emerging identity of the new United States. The property appears to have been planned as a unified complex, with dependencies placed symmetrically on either side of the main house. One remains standing.
The approximately 1,400-square-foot villa has an H-shaped plan formed by a central room and two matching wings. Its broad central gable is topped by two rectangular chimneys running parallel to the roofline.
Inside are eight fireplaces and original random-width pine floors made from hand-sawed boards. Decorative details include a beaded keystone dividing the entry fanlight, an oval medallion on a mantel and ornamented woodwork around doors and windows.
One room exposes the house’s construction methods, allowing visitors to examine the layers inside its walls. The plaster was made with limestone, sand, water and animal hair from hogs and cattle. Outside, lime mortar containing oyster shells holds the brickwork together.
Visitors can also look into the underground icehouse well. Harrington explained that wealthy households obtained blocks of ice cut from northern lakes, making ice storage a sign of affluence.
Even the necessary echoes the villa’s design. Its cornice carries the same dog-tooth dentil pattern found on the main house.
Historian Tony P. Wrenn described Huntley as remarkably refined for a Virginia planter family’s secondary residence. He argued that its architecture, connection to the Mason family, use as a city resident’s country retreat and relatively complete setting combine to make it an important landmark.
Historic Huntley is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Virginia Landmarks Register and the Fairfax County Inventory of Historic Sites.
Tours are offered Saturdays at 10:30 a.m. and noon from April through November. A Family Hilltop Tour featuring stories of the property’s past is scheduled for May 17 from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m., with admission priced at $10.