Williams Mansion (aka Calhoun Mansion), Charleston (must see)

Back in the late 1800s, when Charleston was still recovering from the Civil War, keeping things modest, this house showed up, casually ignoring the mood...

Indeed, this is one of the city’s rare Victorian showpieces, built in the Italianate style, when Charleston wasn’t exactly in a mansion-building phase. Most people were tightening their belts. But George Walton Williams was doing just fine, thanks to having wisely invested in England and the North before the war. In 1876, he went ahead and built what newspapers confidently called the finest home in the South… maybe even the entire country.

And the house still backs up that claim. We’re talking 35 rooms, 24,000 square feet, 23 fireplaces—because one or two simply wouldn’t do—a three-tiered piazza, Italian-style water gardens with fountains, and a cupola soaring 90 feet above the harbor. Not so much a home as a statement...

The name “Calhoun” enters the story later, when Williams’s son-in-law, Patrick Calhoun—grandson of John C. Calhoun—lived here until the 1929 stock market crash took both his fortune and house with it. After that, the mansion drifted through uncertain years, gradually falling into disrepair, until it was actually condemned in the 1970s. Not exactly the ending you’d expect for a place once called the finest in the country...

Luckily, then came the turnaround. A local attorney stepped in, took on the challenge, and spent 25 years—and a small fortune—bringing the house back to life. Today, it feels less like a restoration and more like a carefully staged time capsule.

Inside, you’ll find an extensive collection of English and American furniture from the 18th and 19th centuries, with a strong Southern accent in the decorative arts. Add impressionist paintings, Chinese ceramics, and a mix of carefully chosen objects, and the whole place leans into its original purpose: to impress.

And it still does. The mansion has appeared in magazines, played a role in the miniseries “North and South,” and continues to draw visitors curious enough to step inside.

Mind you, photography is not allowed on the premises, so you’ll have to rely on your memory. Tours run about 35 minutes, and once you step back outside, the gardens—with their statues and fountains—offer a quieter moment to process what you’ve just seen. Because this house is, in essence, Charleston deciding, at least once, to go all in...