The Invisible Servants of The Elms

It's hard to believe, but this 60,000 square foot mansion is sometimes referred to as a summer cottage. This is The Elms in Newport, Rhode Island, built as a summer getaway for Edward Julius Berwind. Sure, it's big, but to guests it was a lot smaller on the inside than the outside. They wouldn't even notice that, because of the sheer size and opulence of the home. The rest of the house was hidden, because that's where the huge staff lived and worked. The interior was designed so that you never saw the work going on; the cleaning, cooking, and serving just happened as if by magic.

While the servants' quarters and work spaces are plain compared to the family and guest spaces at The Elms, they still look quite fancy to the modern eye. Architectural Digest shows us many of the engineering tricks and illusions that kept the dirty work behind genteel living hidden in The Elms.