Opus 40

Opus 40 is the life’s work of sculptor Harvey Fite, who created the sprawling, labyrinthine structure from an old bluestone quarry. Inspired by Mayan ruins, the project began as a place for Fite to display his sculptures before becoming very much a sculpture in itself. For the next thirty-seven years, with little more than hand tools and ancient techniques, he single-handedly toiled over the massive six-acre architectural marvel, before dying of a fall while working on it, three years short of its anticipated forty-year completion.

All this does little to convey any sense of the place itself. It’s a beautiful, circuitous maze in rough hewn grey stone, with standing obelisks and resting pools of murky water. It’s warm rock and deep, cool shadow, winding stairs and steep ramps. Seen from above, it looks smooth and sculptural, but down in it you become lost amid sharp stones and narrow passageways.

Architectural Digest called it “a cousin of Stonehenge and the long since vanished Hanging Gardens of Babylon.” I found it evocative of the stone houses at Skara Brae. But there’s nothing quite like it, and if you ever find yourself in the vicinity of Saugerties, New York, go wander.

Photos, with the exception of the top image, by a dear friend.