Galleries & Exhibitions

R. Lee Taylor Miniatures Gallery

Centerpiece of the gallery, Lee Hall was furnished in the "high" style collector R. Lee Taylor admired. The chandeliers work, the silver is sterling, and the wine is real.
 

Pictured in text

A young visitor peers into Lee Hall.

 

Note

The museum has published a book about the Taylor collection on display at the MSV. Titled R. Lee Taylor Miniatures: The Valley's Tiny Treasures, this illustrated publication is sold through the MSV Museum Store.

 

quickfact

The Lee Hall Miniature has over 40 working light fixtures! Miniatures are made to the scale of one inch to one foot by artists using dental tools, tiny saws, paintbrushes with just two or three hairs, and other special tools of the trade.

A young visitor pears into Lee Hall

This gallery presents an outstanding collection of furnished miniature houses and rooms in first-time permanent museum display.  R. Lee Taylor (1924–2000), partner of Julian Wood Glass Jr. from 1947-1970s, began assembling this collection in the 1970s and by the time of his death, he had assembled an astonishing fourteen rooms and houses furnished with more than four thousand objects.

 

This gallery presents the best of the collection, including the masterpiece Lee Hall. In all, the gallery presents five houses, four rooms, and the work of more than seventy-five miniatures artisans. An interactive touch screen offers visitors the opportunity to view a video Taylor's collecting; scroll through an electronic version of the MSV book, R. Lee Taylor Miniatures: The Valley's Tiny Treasures; and take a virtual tour of the miniature of the Museum's Glen Burnie Historic House (on view in the Garden Visitor Center). Also on display here are four shadowboxes by late Valley miniatures artist William P. Massey, who created his work between the late 1930s to late 1940s.

 

The Miniatures Gallery has quickly become one of the most popular museum presentations, and amazes adults and youth alike. For more information about miniatures and the other museums where miniatures are displayed, visit the National Miniatures Trust website.