The New York Times has a super story on how Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art Director Don Bacigalupi, his partner Dan Feder and their son Guston have become part of the Bentonville community and about the very modern house that suits their decision to live openly in what outsiders might guess is a closed-minded town.
The story reports that when she offered the job to Bacigalupi, Alice Walton was concerned for the family’s happiness in her home town:
Still, even Alice Walton, the Walmart scion who grew up in Bentonville, wasn’t sure the couple would be happy raising their child there. After offering Bacigalupi the job of director of her Crystal Bridges Museum, in 2009, Walton insisted he get to know people in the Ozarks town before deciding. She even went ahead and found potential friends for the two men, via a gay employees group at Walmart. “After knowing that Don was the right fit for us,” Walton wrote in an e-mail, “I wanted to be certain the community was the right fit for him and his family. That was my No. 1 priority.”
Great photographs accompany the story, which you can read here. Here’s our own picture of Bacigalupi and Guston at the November opening of the museum.