Turn off a small country road onto a still smaller one and then, at the sign, take a tiny road rising through the forest. Suddenly, the road clears the woods and there it is, across a meadow, at the top of the hill, just as Jean Langer saw it in her mind’s eye a dozen years ago, the Silver Star B&B Inn.
There are bed-and-breakfasts all over Wisconsin, all across America, in fact, as this country increasingly has embraced a British tradition of charming surroundings, hearty breakfasts, interesting, involved hosts. The Silver Star has all that plus something most don’t. It has a theme.
That theme appears in the sophisticated art that hangs on the rustic log walls of the great room and in the hallways upstairs. It fills the shelves of the library and leaps out in the names of the 10 guestrooms. The theme, Langer’s passion, is photography.
The inn itself is, in a sense, a photo, a capturing of an image. In this case the image was a mental picture Maine native Langer had of a ski lodge transposed to the 340 acres of land her husband, Michael, bought nearly two decades ago.
“It was to be the kind of place where you can kick back and relax, a rustic place,” she said. “It took me three years to design the plans for construction, but it came out exactly like the original image I had.”
Langer graduated from the Maine College of Art with a degree in photography. The photos she takes tend to be of urban and suburban residences that would repulse the editors of Architectural Digest, compositions in aluminum siding and chain-link fence. A collector, as well as a taker, of photographs, Langer has adorned the walls of the Silver Star with contemporary and vintage photos. She seems especially fond of old group photos in which the then momentousness of being photographed shows in serious faces. At different times in different places, she has bought early 20th Century shots of lovely young girls. Only when she was hanging them did she realize that three images are of the same girl.
“She must have been the photographer’s daughter,” Langer said, doing what we all do when looking at photos of people unknown and long gone — wondering what their stories were.
A large, wonderful photo faces the stone fireplace on the first floor of the lodge. It shows a lineup of huge and now antique steam tractors then in their prime, probably caught at a farm equipment competition. Some of the operators sit aboard, like jockeys on metal mammoths.
Though individually decorated, the guestrooms have some things in common. None has a phone or a TV. All have private baths and a connection with photography. The Brady Suite honors Civil War photographer Matthew Brady. The Langers are in the process of getting some Brady photos for the room, part of a goal of taking room identifications further than just the names. The Szarkowski Suite is named for John Szarkowski, former head of the department of photography at the Museum of Modern Art. Szarkowski has heard of this honor but has not yet come to visit “his” room. The Magnum Suite celebrates the syndicate of that name and founders Robert Capa and Henri Cartier-Bresson. There’s the Steiglitz-Steichen Suite (photographers Alfred and Edward) and the Cameron Suite for Julia Margaret Cameron and other women in photography, and so on.
The Silver in the inn’s name refers to the silver halide compound in film emulsion that reacts to light thus recording images.
Near one end of the hall, there’s a nooklike library, an inviting place to curl up with mostly old books and magazines. There’s “How to Make Good Pictures,” an early Eastman Kodak publication; “Split Tone Printing;” and “Joseph Suder, Poet of Prague.” Magazines include Zoom, Aperture, Nueva Luz (new light) and current issues of American Photographer.
Dreams became reality
As his wife’s vision became real, so did Michael Langer’s dream. He had grown up on a dairy farm and longed to leave his job (property management) and the city (Madison) and raise their 3-year-old son, Palidon, in the country. Now 11, Palidon (with a slightly changed spelling) was named for the hero of the TV show of the late ’50s and early ’60s, “Have Gun, Will Travel.”
Five years ago, the Langer family expanded with the birth of Ayla (after a character in Jean Auel’s Earth’s Children series). She was behind the desk when visitors from the Tribune arrived. She explained, “I’m learning to register guests.” She’s also learning photography. On a trip south to the old Wisconsin mining town, Mineral Point, last winter, Ayla took a photo that, it was mentioned, was reminiscent of her mother’s work. Ayla leaned over and whispered, “Mine’s better.”
“The inn has been wonderful for the children,” Jean said. “They’ve gotten to meet people from all over the world.” The little Langers have been carefully taught the difference between being charming and being oppressive, and have a sense of who is, and who is not, kid-friendly.
Almost all of the Silver Star’s business is repeat customers. There are a lot of scholarly conferences held here: a meeting of experts on European economics; a conference on bio-diversity. There are weddings. “I do all the cooking,” Jean said. “I bake the cake.”
“We learned that, with a wedding,” Michael added, “you don’t go the extra mile, you go the extra 100 miles.”
A British gentleman spent two weeks at the inn and taught the Langers how to prepare proper English tea. He came, like many guests, for the inn’s relaxed and arty ambience and its proximity to the American Players Theatre in Spring Green, 15 minutes away.
Michael’s dream of raising a family out in the countryside came true only with a lot of help from the stock market. He dabbled in it, a day trader, and did remarkably well, having picked a good time to dabble and a very good time to stop. That fortunate timing funded the inn, which opened eight years ago.
“This is a difficult way to make money,” Michael said. “An inn usually won’t carry its weight and a lot of innkeepers have other jobs. We couldn’t make it if we didn’t also live here.”
Beautiful landscape
It’s quite a place to live. This landscape is often credited as the creative inspiration for architect Frank Lloyd Wright, whose home, Taliesin, is nearby. The skies are dramatic, the valleys deep, the bluffs rocky, the wildflowers abundant. Jean has switched from store-bought turkeys for Thanksgiving to the wild turkeys that thrive around here and parade, early in the morning, across the front lawn.
“I thought at first that they would be dry and tough,” Jean said, “but the secret is to soak them in brine. I found a recipe in “Joy of Cooking.”
For some guests, the change from urban to this takes some getting used to.
“One evening, the whippoorwills were singing, and a woman who had come here from a big city asked me, `Could you turn down the sound effects?'”
