The Stanly House, a landmark of New Bern, North Carolina, is an icon of Georgian architecture that memorializes American patriot and merchant, John Wright Stanley. The house clearly reflects the wealth and renown of Stanly and his family, who served as merchants, politicians, and lawyers. It is neither situated in an urban nor rural environment: this to an extent reflects how the North Carolinian merchant was neither wholly tied to a Northern urban mercantilist culture nor a Southern plantation culture. It is also simply designed, not ostentatious.