Anne Essner works to preserve Sarasota’s notable buildings for all to enjoy

When Anne and Bob Essner first visited Sarasota in 2009, looking to escape the cold, gray winter days of New York City, they were thinking condo. Apartment living is what they knew. Then, at the urging of a friend, they toured Lido Shores, a haven for mid-century modern homes built in the 1950 and ’60s.

Instantly enchanted by a design style they were not familiar with, the Essners bought a home — a waterfront home that happened to be across the street from the renowned Umbrella House, which was designed by Paul Rudolph, one of the founders of the Sarasota School of Architecture. 

“It was missing the umbrella on it at the time,” Anne Essner says, referring to the shade structure that covers the house and pool. “So it just looked like a little cube house. It was not that intriguing.”

Within six years of moving to Lido Shores, the couple purchased the Harkavy House, also designed by Rudolph, and bought and restored the Umbrella House, outfitting it with mid-mod furniture. 

Anne Essner grew up in Plattsburgh, New York, about 25 miles from the Canadian border, and earned her MBA from Columbia University. She met Bob while on a job interview with the Sandoz pharmaceutical corporation. They became colleagues in the marketing department and married in 1987. Bob retired as chairman of the board and CEO of Wyeth Pharmaceuticals in 2006. 

Photo by Lori Sax

Since their arrival in Sarasota, the Essners have been active philanthropists. Anne, in particular, became ensconced in the city’s rich architectural scene. In 2021, she helped facilitate the merger of the Sarasota Architectural Foundation and Center for Architecture Sarasota into Architecture Sarasota. She is the organization’s board chair. Anne is also a board member of Gulf Coast Community Foundation. 

The couple resides in the home they originally bought and have never lived in the Umbrella House. They make it available for charity fetes, monthly tours and other events celebrating Sarasota’s architecture. 

Here are edited excerpts from a conversation with Anne. 

I was one of those “Fountainhead”-reading teenagers who for a brief moment wanted to be an architect. And then I found out you had to take physics to apply for architecture school. We had a terrible physics professor, and my dreams died right there.

My husband retired, and we were in New York over the winter. And he just couldn’t get used to the dark, gray days. He’d been in an office all the time, and it didn’t even occur to him there was weather outside. And he was like, “I can’t live here.”

We had spent some time on the east coast [of Florida] and we knew that wasn’t what we wanted. 

We went to a lot of galas when we first moved here. It was such a change. You didn’t see many ball gowns in New York. But here, people really got dressed up. They really got into it. One year, we accepted invitations that got us out and dressed up 31 nights in a row.

We had not lived in places where there was a lot of mid-century modern architecture. Sarasota is highly known for its mid-century modern. And, so, we just sort of fell in love with the simplicity of it.

With mid-mod, you’ve got this inside-out idea. Your room is not just your room. It’s the outside area as well — it’s your terrace, it’s your pool, it’s your gardens that visually expand the small rooms in the house.

After we’d lived here a couple years, we decided we needed to look for a guest house and a music space. My husband is a big audiophile. We found this house down the street, designed by Paul Rudolph. The Harkavy House. It was our first cube house. We bought an electric golf cart so we could go back and forth quickly.

I kind of got on a classical music bent when I was young. I played instruments. But I rarely just sit down and listen, whereas Bob can’t carry a tune but loves music and will sit for hours and listen.

You’ve got to like Steely Dan if you’re going to like Bob and Bob’s going to like you. I like Steely Dan too — but I picked that up from Bob.

It’s so typical that people don’t always value what’s right in front of them. I think a lot of people here in Sarasota don’t realize the international reach of [the Sarasota School].

Sarasota has a tremendous amount of high-rise building going on, and some of that’s appropriate. But some of it, you have to wonder: What are we losing here? 

I’ve had people who come into the Umbrella House and they’re like, “Wow, I’ve seen pictures, but being in the house is so much different than seeing images of it.” And I think that’s one of the reasons why it’s been so important to me that we save these houses, because it’s an entirely different experience to be in them.

You’ve got to come down [to Lido Shores] some time. I promise you, you’ll leave here saying, “Oh, now I get it.”

The house we live in was designed by Adrienne Vittadini, who had a well-known knitwear brand. I used to wear her sweaters in college. She sold the brand in the ’90s.

I have two stepdaughters and one son who was born of our marriage. The oldest is going to be 50 shortly, the next one is 42, and my son is 35. As a stepparent, you always worry that a blended family may not click. But these kids are very close. Our family is very fortunate.

For information on touring the Umbrella House, visit ArchitectureSarasota.org.