Thomas Jefferson’s 275th Birthday

Tomorrow, April 13th, 2018, marks the 275th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson’s birth. I have had a long relationship with TJ (as some of us call him here in Virginia) ever since I moved here thirty years ago. I was delighted when I learned that he had designed another house, after his famous home (a UNESCO […]

Poplar Forest & Monticello (Esoteric & Exoteric)

Thomas Jefferson’s Houses and Gardens [TJ’s Houses and Gardens] Copyright 2007 Katherine Neville Please contact Katherine Neville for permission to quote from this article. From: Katherine Neville  To: Lynn Beebe, President and Travis McDonald, Historian of Poplar Forest May, 2007 Dear Lynn and Travis– Here are my notes on TJ’s two kinds of architecture: esoteric and exoteric. As I […]

The Sacred Architecture of Thomas Jefferson

written July 4, 2010 (Katherine Neville’s July 4th Newsletter) “THE SACRED ARCHITECTURE OF THOMAS JEFFERSON” “Let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them.” -Thomas Jefferson, July 4, 1826 On July 4, 1826–a date that, coincidentally, also marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence–Thomas […]

Heaven & Earth

As layers and years of neglect of the Japanese House were peeled away, something interesting emerged: a vision of “the house within the house.” It was not my vision, however. I am not an expert in Japanese architecture or any other. It was the vision of what the house itself wanted to be. I had […]

KATHERINE NEVILLE’S Octal Newsletter October 4, 2012

  KATHERINE NEVILLE’S Octal Newsletter October 4, 2012   “Oc” in Rome: the 8th Month In the ancient Roman calendar, which began in March at the equinox, September was counted as the 7th month (“Sept” means 7), October was the 8th month, November the 9th, and December the 10th. I’m partial to all things octal, […]

KATHERINE NEVILLE’S July 4th Newsletter July 4, 2010

“THE SACRED ARCHITECTURE OF THOMAS JEFFERSON” July 4, 2010 “Let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them.” -Thomas Jefferson, July 4, 1826 On July 4, 1826–a date that, coincidentally, also marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence–Thomas Jefferson and John Adams […]

The Sufis of Turkey

December 2000 marked an important historic event in Sufi annals: the first Mevlana Symposium was held in Turkey, to commemorate the 727th anniversary of the death of the great poet and mystic, Jalal al-Din Rumi (known throughout Turkey as Mevlana, not as Rumi), the founder of the Mevlevi Order (The Whirling Dervishes). The congress took […]