Through exhibitions, programs and partnerships we strive to be an active community resource, connecting contemporary audiences to Esherick’s brilliant creations and the beauty of the everyday.
Upcoming Events
Current Installation
Art, Work, and Everyday Life: A New Look at the Esherick Studio
While several of Esherick’s works travel with The Crafted World of Wharton Esherick, we are excited to offer visitors a chance to experience the Studio space in a new way with the installation of Art, Work, and Everyday Life: A New Look at the Esherick Studio. With over 70 Esherick works are on the road, we have the unique opportunity to showcase rarely seen objects from our collection and beyond. These new displays highlight both the artworks and the ephemera of Esherick’s daily life — from work tables and easels to handmade ceramic dishes — and reintroduce the Studio as an ever-changing space of creative activity. Learn more about the new Studio setup here!
Current Exhibition
Voyage of Renewal: Wharton Esherick in Germany and Scandinavia
March 1, 2025 – June 1, 2025
The summer of 1931 was a pivotal moment in Wharton Esherick’s career. Though he was on the verge of creating some of his most memorable furniture designs, his life weighed on him to the extent that he felt listless, in his words,“flat as a desert.” Renewal came in the form of a trip to Germany and Scandinavia that was funded by one of his great patrons, German American businesswoman Helene Fischer. Voyage of Renewal follows Esherick’s travels through Germany, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Drawing on WEM’s archives and collections, the exhibition features one of Esherick’s seven travel sketchbooks from the journey, historic photographs, a selection of souvenir postcards, and woodblock prints and printed textiles that he made from his sketches after returning home. Through these materials, Voyage of Renewal gives insight into the people, experiences, and sights that restored his excitement for his art and life. The exhibition is in conjunction with the loan from a private collection of the Hannah Weil Worktable (1931) –now on view in the Esherick Studio–which Esherick designed and built for German sculptor Hannah Weil during his time overseas.
The exhibition is in the Visitor Center, which is open during our tour hours. Please note, guests wishing to enter the Studio must make advance reservations for a tour.
Offsite Exhibition
The Crafted World of Wharton Esherick
This exhibition explores the interdisciplinary creativity of Wharton Esherick (1887-1970), the famed American artist best known as the father of the Studio Furniture Movement.
Esherick considered his hillside home and studio, now the Wharton Esherick Museum (WEM), the best representation of his iconoclastic vision, calling it “an autobiography in three dimensions.” Built between 1926 and 1966, his unconventional escape on the verdant slopes of Valley Forge Mountain houses almost 3000 iconic works of art from across Esherick’s seven decades of artistic practice.
The Crafted World brings selections from this rich and rarely loaned collection to a broader public, including many objects never before seen except in Esherick’s home and studio. Detailing the artist’s career from his early woodcut illustrations for books by members of the avant-garde literati to his revolutionary reimagining of furniture forms as organic sculpture, works will be presented in thematic vignettes that invite visitors into Esherick’s story and bring the essence of his creative world into the gallery.
This exhibition will be on view at-
• Brandywine Museum of Art in Chadds Ford, PA: October 12, 2024–January 19, 2025
• Chazen Museum of Art, Madison, WI: February 17-May 18, 2025
• Taft Museum of Art, Cincinnati, OH: June 7- September 7, 2025
2025 Artist-in-Residence
Kelly Cobb
Detail of skirt woven by Letty Esherick.
Since 2021, The Wharton Esherick Museum’s Artist-in-Residence (AIR) program is designed to facilitate meaningful conversation between contemporary makers and the museum’s collections. WEM invites artists to engage with the site in ways that are unique to their creative practice, including concentrated time in the Studio; access to archival materials, historic photos, and ephemera; and other opportunities for creative research. We are delighted to welcome Philadelphia-based textile designer and researcher Kelly Cobb as the 2025 WEM Artist-in-Residence.
Kelly Cobb is an Associate Professor of Fashion and Apparel Studies at The University of Delaware and the Director of the Textile RAD Lab. Her research examines the complexities inherent in apparel and textile supply chains through creative, project-based work that reintegrates the wearer of clothes to local trades and economies, restoring integrity and kinship to the origins of materials and to the environmental resources and human labor involved in textile and apparel production. You can explore Cobb’s past and ongoing projects on her website here, as well as through the Textile RAD Lab (Research Through Applied Discovery).
At present, Kelly is focusing her research and thinking on WEM’s textile holdings, and the garments and weavings made by Letty Esherick. Through archival study, material experimentation, and public engagement, this project will highlight Letty’s creative life through her contributions as a weaver, garment maker, educator, and community builder. We are thrilled to offer Kelly the opportunity to engage with WEM’s campus, collections and archives, and can’t wait to see where her research takes her over the course of her residency.
Kelly shares that “My study of textile, material, and methodology encompasses ancient techniques of dyeing, weaving, and spinning, and compels my design work. Textiles connect us to their origins sympathetically and through the senses. I adopt the metaphor of traditional fiber processes such as spinning, dyeing, weaving, and knitting as systems of collective and transformative interaction through social engagement. The process of transforming fiber is inherently collaborative: we work, learn, and make together.”
Past projects include the simulation of a regional textile supply chain through the production of a “100-Mile Suit” at the ICA Philadelphia, a global multi-disciplinary research collaboration with Denimatrix, involving tracing the denim supply chain with the objective of demystifying it, from a Texas field to a Guatemala factory, to a New York City showroom floor, and “Wearing Well-Being” which explores the impact of co-creative design approaches in late-stage eldercare through the development of wearable narratives, hypothesizing that the textile and garment creation is, in itself, a valuable therapeutic tool.
This residency, which is offered by invitation only, has culminated in varied ways including site-specific installations in the Esherick Studio, performances in the Kahn Workshop, and exhibitions in our Visitor Center. You can explore past AIR projects here.
Programs
Off the Shelf–
Wharton Esherick Museum Book Club
Calling all Esherick fans and readers! Off the Shelf is an Esherick-like twist on the classic book club! It provides the opportunity for bookworms, Esherick fans, and local community members alike to explore Wharton Esherick’s legacy through the artist’s own richly stocked bookshelves, as well as recently published books that illuminate Esherick’s artistic networks and enduring legacy.
Meetings are once a month and take place in Esherick’s 1956 Workshop and features an exclusive look into WEM’s special collections and archives to explore materials related to the month’s book. Discussions will be moderated by friend of the museum, WEM board member, and Director of West Chester University Special Collections, Ron McColl, and will feature occasional guest specialists.
The Margaret Esherick House
In 2024, the Wharton Esherick Museum launched a partnership with the owners of the Margaret Esherick House to offer tours and programs at this iconic modernist home on select dates throughout the year. Commissioned by Margaret Esherick, Wharton’s niece, the house was designed by world-renowned architect Louis Kahn and features an extraordinary kitchen conceived and installed by Wharton Esherick during the construction of the house. Recognizing the architectural importance of the house, the homeowners have generously collaborated with WEM on this ongoing series of select public events, sharing their private residence for the benefit of the museum and its supporters.
Imprint 2025: Renewal
Imprint 2025: Renewal is our 17th annual high school print competition and exhibition! This online exhibition, viewable now on our website, represents a juried selection of works submitted by high school students from across Berks, Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Lehigh, Montgomery, and Philadelphia Counties.
The Imprint program encourages new generations of young artists in the medium of relief printmaking. For this year’s Imprint exhibition we invited Judith Thomas, Deputy Director at Brandywine Workshop and Archives, to jury the students’ work, which responded to the theme of “Renewal.” A look back over the incredible work Wharton Esherick produced over an illustrious four decade career reveals countless examples of renewal. He changed media multiple times, creating in painting, drawing, printmaking, ceramics, and, of course, wood! Esherick saw new possibilities in old and seemingly worthless things. Take, for example, the infamous Hammer Handle Chair, one of about 45 total pieces made out of roughly 800 hammer handles he won at auction.
Recognizing the pivotal role that printmaking played in Esherick’s life, we are delighted to once again highlight young artists who represent the future of this powerful medium, with Imprint 2025: Renewal. We were astounded by the skill and creativity of the submissions and send a huge thank you to all the art teachers and students who shared their work with us!
Dinner Time by Madelyn Dannenfelser of Abington Senior High School
Everything Else
Center for Creative Works Residency
In April of 2018, the Wharton Esherick Museum launched a new partnership with the Center for Creative Works, an art studio focusing on developing creative workplace potential and cultural identity for people with intellectual disabilities. During the residency, a dedicated group of artists from CCW are on site weekly to draw inspiration from Esherick’s work through observation, sketching, model-making and discussion. With guidance from furniture makers and woodworking instructors the resident CCW artists refine their designs and techniques at the CCW woodshop and facilities in Wynnewood.
Philly Touch Tours
With support from the National Endowment for the Arts and other generous funders, the Wharton Esherick Museum has engaged Philly Touch Tours to design, develop and host accessible touch experiences for people with vision loss. Philly Touch Tours LLC, founded in 2015, provides accessibility consulting and touch tour program design for museums and cultural institutions and Disability Awareness and Sensitivity Training for museum and cultural institution staff. Philly Touch Tours will, in collaboration with the Museum, design and facilitate touch tours, provide training for Museum staff and volunteers on leading tours for individuals with vision loss and produce Braille and large print materials. The program aims to inspire curiosity and facilitate a meaningful experience for people with vision loss, while disseminating information about The Wharton Esherick Museum’s history, its collection and its active engagement with the public.
CraftNOW
Launched in 2014, CraftNOW Philadelphia unites the leading institutions and artists of Philadelphia’s craft community in a celebration of the city’s rich legacy of craft, its internationally-recognized contemporary craft scene, and its important role as an incubator for arts based in wood, clay, fiber, metal and glass. Through both creating and spotlighting events during the week of the Philadelphia Museum of Art Craft Show, CraftNOW invites locals and visitors alike to explore Philadelphia’s innovations in the world of the handmade.
The Wharton Esherick Museum is a proud member of the consortium of individuals, galleries, museums, universities, retailers, and civic organizations who participate in CraftNOW each November. For details on CraftNOW events visit our event calendar.