Explore Thomas Cole

Prominent American architect, and one of the original members of the National Academy of Design. Town and his partner, Andrew Jackson Davis, were leaders of the Greek and Gothic Revival movements during the nineteenth century. Town instructed Cole's nephew William Henry Bayless in architectural drawing and unsuccessfully competed against Cole for the design of the Ohio State House. Town's firm designed the Wadsworth Atheneum in the Gothic Revival style for Cole's patron Daniel Wadsworth. Cole painted The Architect's Dream in 1841 for Town, who ultimately rejected the painting because it was "exclusively architectural."