THE OVAL ROOM, THE FRICK COLLECTION | PHOTO BY JOSEPH COSCIA JR.

It’s almost too much, in the best possible way.

After completion of a four-year, $220 million renovation project, The Frick Collection and its magnificent array of artwork and artifacts are back in the public eye. A must-see venture for anyone visiting New York City, it re-opened April 17.

Opulent, yes, but also tasteful. There are two floors of carefully curated paintings, sculptures, medals, golden clocks, tapestries… And of course, every room is steeped in history. Industrialist and Pittsburgh icon Henry Clay Frick built the Beaux-Arts mansion just off Central Park East in 1914.

Frick (1849-1919) bequeathed the New York mansion and his collection to the public, with the museum opening in 1935. His daughter, Helen Clay Frick, founded the institution’s Frick Art Research Library in 1920. The latter is open to the public as well.

Pre-renovation, visitors were limited to wandering the ground floor. Now, what had been the upstairs family’s bedrooms is also a showcase for part of the institution’s vast collection.

EXTERIOR OF THE FRICK COLLECTION ON FIFTH AVENUE IN NEW YORK CITY | PHOTO BY NICHOLAS VENEZIA

Visitors with “Fellow” and higher levels of membership at The Frick Pittsburgh — which offers tours of Henry Clay Frick’s Point Breeze mansion, Clayton, where the family lived from 1883 to 1905 — can tour The Frick Collection for free under the North American Reciprocal Museum Association and Reciprocal Organization of Associated Museums. Pittsburgh visitors holding those cards can present them at The Frick Collection’s admission desk, and they will be given two complimentary tickets for the next available timed slot.

On our recent visit about a week after the grand re-opening, those with tickets purchased online were lined up on one side of the East 70th Street entrance. On the other side was a line of about 40 people without tickets. No word on how long they had to wait for their admission. New York Frick contributors had only to show their cards and walked right in.

A Frick spokesperson said the institution doesn’t have attendance numbers, but that it’s been selling out approximately a week in advance for all time slots during the 7-hour operating day (11 a.m.-6 p.m.). An excellent website with details about the collection can be found via QR code scan for smart phones and also at www.frick.org.

Detailed descriptions are not printed on the wall; visitors can pick up a printed guide upon entrance to the museum or use the free mobile guide to look up objects from the collection.

THE WALNUT ROOM, THE FRICK COLLECTION | PHOTO BY JOSEPH COSCIA JR.

There are special evening hours as well. The crowds aren’t quite as packed during the extended Friday sessions, when The Frick is open until 9 p.m. There are also regularly scheduled Garden Court live music events and brief gallery talks throughout those nights.

We were fortunate to have 11:30 a.m. slots because the crowds grew noticeably even a half-hour after entrance. But what a show: a dizzying array of paintings, many from the great masters. Two Vermeers (“Girl Interrupted at Her Music” and “Officer and Laughing Girl”) grace the walls of the South hallway; a third, “Mistress and Maid,” is in the West Gallery.

Some visitors came to ooh and aah, others were more reflective. Standing in front of Aelbert Cuyp’s peaceful landscape “Cows and Herdsmen By a River,” a pleasant-looking white-haired woman remarked to herself “They have a nice life. Maybe somebody plays music for them.” Twenty minutes later, a friend caught up to her in a different room and she was still musing about the cows.

GARDEN COURT, THE FRICK COLLECTION | PHOTO BY JOSEPH COSCIA JR.

The Capital-A Art is everywhere. On a grand scale, a self-portrait of Rembrandt hangs in the first floor West Gallery. It’s one of the Dutch master’s three oils in The Frick Collection. Speaking of portraits: above the massive marble fireplace of the library is Danish painter John C. Johansen’s vision of Frick himself.

Indeed, amid the wealth of paintings — not to mention clocks, textiles, medals, sculptures, furniture and enamels — it’s almost easy to miss famous works. In the Impressionist Room, we almost walked right past Edgar Degas’ “The Rehearsal” while admiring Edouard Manet’s “The Bullfight.”

There are five large, sweeping works by Britain’s Joseph Mallord William Turner, also works by Titian, Monet, El Greco, Whistler and an art history lectures-worth of others.

A special exhibition of porcelain sculptures by Ukrainian artist Vladimir Kanevsky is on loan for the opening months. His “garden” of flowers — foxgloves, cascades of white roses, lilacs, bouquets of peonies, a lemon tree in the Garden Court among others — is astonishing in its lifelike beauty.

THE BOUCHER ROOM, THE FRICK COLLECTION | PHOTO BY JOSEPH COSCIA JR.

It’s hard to believe they’re not real. Two women drew near to the pinky hydrangeas in the second-floor breakfast room, close enough to draw a mild warning of “don’t touch it” from the guard.

“Don’t worry,” her companion replied, “She’s an art curator.”

Some of these art treasures were part of an exhibition at The Frick Pittsburgh last spring. But the differences between Pittsburgh and New York locations are celebrated by both organizations. The Clayton mansion has 23 rooms, roughly 6,000 square feet. It sits along Penn Avenue, with a greenhouse, carriage house, art museum, cafe and visitor center on the garden-landscaped grounds.

By comparison, if Clayton were one man’s home, The Frick mansion in New York City — at 196,000 square feet — was his castle.

THE WEST GALLERY, THE FRICK COLLECTION | PHOTO BY JOSEPH COSCIA JR.

His two homes have been referred to as “two sides of a coin.” The life of the man is on display at Clayton: family heirlooms, clothing, china from the Westmoreland train, everyday furniture (albeit very nice furniture indeed) and earlier, more American art pieces give visitors a more intimate view of his life.

The Frick Collection in NYC is art-oriented and has none of his personal effects on display.

Allow at least a couple of hours to tour the New York venue, more to linger in the glow of great art.

The Frick Collection is closed Mondays and Tuesdays, although it will begin Monday hours in late June. A second-floor cafe also will be open in June. Admission is $30 for adults, $22 for seniors over 65 and for those with disabilities, $17 for students with ID. Those 10-18 are admitted free; those under 10 are not permitted inside. On Wednesdays, there is a pay-as-you-wish admission between 2-6 p.m.

The Art Research Library reading room is free to the public. Those planning to explore the library’s resources must pre-register.

[Correction May 16, 2025: There is reciprocal free admission between The Frick Pittsburgh and The Frick Collection, and vice versa, for those with higher membership levels at both institutions.]  

Maria Sciullo is a freelance writer and museum aficionado. Her only quibble with The Frick Collection was its relative lack of dogs on display. Perhaps next time.