Step Inside This Grand Rockefeller Manse in Upstate New York

Socialite Happy Rockefeller passed away earlier this week at the age of 88. And while she may have been known for her philanthropic work (and her controversial marriage to Governor Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller), she was also a part of a Rockefeller generation that donated the famous Pocantico Hills Rockefeller family estate, Kykuit, to the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Not familiar with it? Step right in...

About 40 minutes outside of Manhattan, according to Google Maps, Kykuit (pronounced KEYE-kut) was completed in 1913 by architects Chester Holmes Aldrich and William Adams Delano for John D. Rockefeller. Four generations of the family called the neo-Georgian, 40-room mansion home, with its whacky, Classical-meets-Rococo facade and grand rooms designed by Ogden Codman Jr. But as impressive as the house is, the floor plans show how rationally the rooms are arranged. The first floor, for example, is not the maze you may expect but is instead an enfilade of entertaining spaces. There's nothing more satisfying than looking from one end of a house straight through a series of perfectly-aligned doors to the other end, right?

If you're more of an outdoor person, the gardens, designed by William Welles Bosworth, include an enviable sculpture collection and views of the Hudson River valley that give a not-so-subtle sense of why the Rockefellers chose to name the estate after the Dutch word for "lookout". Kykuit is open Thursdays through Sundays.