Walk the downtown waterfront and you might pass it without a second look. A couch. A loveseat. A couple of armchairs. Then you notice they're made of stone, carved to look like puffy white clouds, and pointed straight at the Hudson. Welcome to the Cloud Living Room.
Who Made It
The furniture is the work of Barbara Segal, a stone carver who lives and works in Yonkers. She co-founded Art on Main Street, a group that brought public art to downtown Yonkers while the waterfront was being rebuilt. In 2015, she received a Yonkers Visionary Award.
The Cloud Living Room went in back in 2003. Segal calls the set a Cloud Couch, a Cloud Loveseat and two Cloud Lounge Chairs. They're carved mostly from white Vermont marble. She describes them as having a front row seat to the river, and she's right. Sit on the couch and you're looking across the water at the Palisades.
It's Not the Only Room
The living room sits inside the Yonkers Sculpture Meadow on the Hudson, at 20 Water Grant Street. Segal led the project, and she didn't do it alone. She and a team of other artists carved four outdoor "rooms" for the meadow, using marble and limestone. The result is a house with no walls on a strip of riverfront. Anyone can wander in and sit down.
Twenty years outdoors takes a toll on any park, though. The sculptures showed wear and tear. In June 2024, Segal oversaw a repair and restoration of the sculptures. The work was paid for by the Yonkers Community Development Agency. Mayor Mike Spano joined her to unveil the restored pieces, and the Mayor called them "a staple along our waterfront."
The Piece You've Already Seen
Here's the twist. Even if you've never walked through the meadow, you've probably seen Segal's work. You might have driven right under it.
In 2005, two giant cast aluminum waves went up on the sides of the railroad bridge at the Yonkers train station. The piece was commissioned by MTA Arts and Design, the program that puts art in train and subway stations. It's called Muhheakantuck. That's the Lenape name for the Hudson.
The name has a great meaning. It's often translated as "the river that flows two ways." The Hudson is tidal, so the tide can push the water upstream or downstream. That happens all the way up past Albany, to the city of Troy. Segal's waves are her version of that moving water, frozen in metal over the street.
Look closely next time you pass under the bridge. The two sides aren't the same. Segal has written that one side marks where the Hudson once met tall cliffs, before downtown Yonkers was built. The other marks the old path of the Saw Mill River, which locals also know by its older name, the Nepperhan.
Go Sit on a Cloud
The meadow is on the downtown waterfront at 20 Water Grant Street. It's an outdoor sculpture park, and the furniture was made to be used. Bring a coffee, take the couch, and watch the boats go by. Then head over to the train station and look up at the waves on the bridge. Same artist, same river, two very different ways to see it.
Follow @TheYonkersCollective for more Yonkers stories, and read Not Upstate at thenineonefour.com.
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