Entrance Hall - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Entrance Hall is the primary and formal entrance to the White House

White House

The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...

, the official residence

Official residence

An official residence is the residence at which heads of state, heads of government, gubernatorial or other senior figures officially reside...

of the President of the United States

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

. The room is rectilinear in shape and measures approximately 31 by 44 feet. Located on the State Floor, the room is entered from outdoors through the North Portico, which faces the North Lawn

North Lawn (White House)

The North Lawn at the White House in Washington, DC, is bordered on the north by Pennsylvania Avenue with a wide view of the mansion, and is screened by dense plantings on the east from East Executive Drive and the Treasury Building, and on the west from West Executive Drive and the Old Executive...

and Pennsylvania Avenue

Pennsylvania Avenue

Pennsylvania Avenue is a street in Washington, D.C. that joins the White House and the United States Capitol. Called "America's Main Street", it is the location of official parades and processions, as well as protest marches...

. The south side of the room opens to the Cross Hall through a screen of paired Roman Doric

Doric order

The Doric order was one of the three orders or organizational systems of ancient Greek or classical architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian.-History:...

columns. The east wall opens to the Grand Staircase

Grand Staircase (White House)

The Grand Staircase is the chief stairway connecting the State Floor and the Second Floor of the White House, the official home of the president of the United States. The stairway is primarily used for a ceremony called the Presidential Entrance March...

Hoban's 1792 and 1817 designs

Architect James Hoban's

James Hoban

James Hoban was an Irish architect, best known for designing The White House in Washington, D.C.-Life:James Hoban was born and raised in a thatched cottage on the Earl of Desart's estate in Cuffesgrange, near Callan in Co. Kilkenny...

original floor plans show a similar room, but with single columns separating the Entrance Hall and Cross Hall, and with the Grand Stair entering into the Cross Hall. Mid-19th century photographs show the room as rebuilt by Hoban following the 1814 White House fire

Burning of Washington

The Burning of Washington was an armed conflict during the War of 1812 between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the United States of America. On August 24, 1814, led by General Robert Ross, a British force occupied Washington, D.C. and set fire to many public buildings following...

. In these photographs two Ionic columns

Ionic order

The Ionic order forms one of the three orders or organizational systems of classical architecture, the other two canonic orders being the Doric and the Corinthian...

support a series of shallow arch

Arch

An arch is a structure that spans a space and supports a load. Arches appeared as early as the 2nd millennium BC in Mesopotamian brick architecture and their systematic use started with the Ancient Romans who were the first to apply the technique to a wide range of structures.-Technical aspects:The...

es, and a frieze

Frieze

thumb|267px|Frieze of the [[Tower of the Winds]], AthensIn architecture the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Even when neither columns nor pilasters are expressed, on an astylar wall it lies upon...

of bas-relief anthemion

Palmette

The palmette is a motif in decorative art which, in its most characteristic expression, resembles the fan-shaped leaves of a palm tree. It has an extremely long history, originating in Ancient Egypt with a subsequent development through the art of most of Eurasia, often in forms that bear...

encircling the room. The shafts of Hoban's columns are recorded as being a blue marble.

Changes by Walter and Brumidi

In 1853 Thomas U. Walter

Thomas U. Walter

Thomas Ustick Walter of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania was an American architect, the dean of American architecture between the 1820 death of Benjamin Latrobe and the emergence of H.H. Richardson in the 1870s...

installed a cast iron and clear glass screen between the Entrance Hall and Cross Hall to reduce drafts, and a complexly patterned Minton encaustic tile

Encaustic tile

Encaustic tiles are ceramic tiles in which the pattern or figure on the surface is not a product of the glaze but of different colors of clay. They are usually of two colors but a tile may be composed of as many as six. The pattern is inlaid into the body of the tile, so that the design remains as...

floor. In 1869 Constantino Brumidi

Constantino Brumidi

Constantino Brumidi was an Greek/Italian-American historical painter, best known and honored for his fresco work in the Capitol Building in Washington, DC.-Parentage and early life:...

, the fresco

Fresco

Fresco is any of several related mural painting types, executed on plaster on walls or ceilings. The word fresco comes from the Greek word affresca which derives from the Latin word for "fresh". Frescoes first developed in the ancient world and continued to be popular through the Renaissance...

painter who had recently painted The Apotheosis of Washington
The Apotheosis of Washington
The Apotheosis of Washington is the immense fresco painted by Italian artist Constantino Brumidi in 1865 and visible through the oculus of the dome in the rotunda of the United States Capitol Building. The fresco is suspended above the rotunda floor and covers an area of . The figures painted are...

in the ceiling of the new rotunda

United States Capitol Rotunda

The United States Capitol rotunda is the central rotunda of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.. Located below the Capitol dome, it is the tallest part of the Capitol and has been described as its "symbolic and physical heart."...

and Senate

United States Senate

The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

wing of the Capitol

United States Capitol

The United States Capitol is the meeting place of the United States Congress, the legislature of the federal government of the United States. Located in Washington, D.C., it sits atop Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall...

, applied highly ornamental painted decoration to the walls and ceilings including profile portraits of George Washington

George Washington

George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

and Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

. On the ceiling Brumidi painted allegorical figures of Union and Liberty. They have survived and are displayed in the ground floor of the White House in the Palm Room.

Tiffany and the Aesthetic Movement

In 1882 President Chester A. Arthur

Chester A. Arthur

Chester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...

commissioned Louis Comfort Tiffany

Louis Comfort Tiffany

Louis Comfort Tiffany was an American artist and designer who worked in the decorative arts and is best known for his work in stained glass. He is the American artist most associated with the Art Nouveau and Aesthetic movements...

to replace Walter's clear glass panels in the screen and the front door with fashionable colored art glass. The patterns included American eagles, and a shield with stripes, stars, and the initials "U.S." A high example of the Aesthetic Movement, Tiffany's glass would remain into the early 20th century. A recreation of the Tiffany screen by Peter Waddell can be seen here.

McKim's return to Neoclassicism

In 1902, soon after taking office and occupying the White House, President Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...

engaged architect Charles Follen McKim

Charles Follen McKim

Charles Follen McKim FAIA was an American Beaux-Arts architect of the late 19th century. Along with Stanford White, he provided the architectural expertise as a member of the partnership McKim, Mead, and White....

in the redesign of the White House. McKim reconfigued the house, adding wings, demolishing the greenhouses, and sweeping away the ornate late 19th century interiors. McKim attempted to make the White House interiors appear closer to how they had near the time of construction, during the period of the early republic. McKim's office McKim, Mead, and White

McKim, Mead, and White

McKim, Mead & White was a prominent American architectural firm at the turn of the twentieth century and in the history of American architecture. The firm's founding partners were Charles Follen McKim , William Rutherford Mead and Stanford White...

researched the house's history, and where no clear documentation was available created rooms in the then popular Colonial Revival and Beaux Arts styles.

In the Entrance Hall, McKim removed the Tiffany screen, Hoban's Ionic columns, and the ornamental painting. In its place he created a far simpler neoclassical interior. On the south side of the room is a screen of single and paired Roman Doric columns. Doric pillasters are used on the east, north and west wall. A robust entablature

Entablature

An entablature refers to the superstructure of moldings and bands which lie horizontally above columns, resting on their capitals. Entablatures are major elements of classical architecture, and are commonly divided into the architrave , the frieze ,...

of triglyph

Triglyph

Triglyph is an architectural term for the vertically channeled tablets of the Doric frieze, so called because of the angular channels in them, two perfect and one divided, the two chamfered angles or hemiglyphs being reckoned as one. The square recessed spaces between the triglyphs on a Doric...

s, garlanded bureaucrania

Bucranium

Bucranium, plural bucrania , is the word for the skull of an ox. It is also an architectural term used to describe a common form of carved decoration in Classical architecture, used to fill the metopes between the triglyphs of the frieze of Doric temples...

, ornamental cuirass

Cuirass

A cuirass is a piece of armour, formed of a single or multiple pieces of metal or other rigid material, which covers the front of the torso...

, and spread Roman eagles integrate the frieze and ceiling. A simple color palette of soft ochres, gray and white contrasted dramatically with the Victorian era

Victorian era

The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...

interior. The presidential arms

Seal of the President of the United States

The Seal of the President of the United States is used to mark correspondence from the U.S. president to the United States Congress, and is also used as a symbol of the presidency. The central design, based on the Great Seal of the United States, is the official coat of arms of the U.S...

were cast in bronze and installed in the center of the room's floor. Bronze torchères, still in use, and a simple lantern with a cylindrical glass chimney lit the room. McKim's new finishes though robust in form were made of plaster and stucco over wood frames hastily added to Hoban's original surfaces. While the response to McKim's interiors were positive, the Entrance Hall has been criticized for being more appropriate to a public building than a home.

Truman reconstruction

By 1948 the White House had become physically unstable, and the house was temporarily abandoned while a major reconstruction took place. The building's interior was dismantled, the furnishings and decorative items were stored, and a new steel frame was built within the exterior walls. Truman used this opportunity to reposition the entrance to the Grand Stair. Architect Lorenzo Simmons Winslow explored several options for the reorientation of the Grand Stair before convincing President Truman of the present configuration where it opens to the center of the east wall of the Entrance Hall. Except for the new stair opening, most of McKim's design was followed but now reinterpreted in light gray Joliet marble instead of warm hued Sienna stone and painted plaster. Cut into the stone casement around the opening to the Grand Staircase are the seals of the thirteen original American states. The Truman era floor is laid in a tesselated

Tessellation

A tessellation or tiling of the plane is a pattern of plane figures that fills the plane with no overlaps and no gaps. One may also speak of tessellations of parts of the plane or of other surfaces. Generalizations to higher dimensions are also possible. Tessellations frequently appeared in the art...

pattern of Westbury cream and Vermont

Vermont

Vermont is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state ranks 43rd in land area, , and 45th in total area. Its population according to the 2010 census, 630,337, is the second smallest in the country, larger only than Wyoming. It is the only New England...

marble. Truman thought it inappropriate to walk across the seal of the president that McKim had placed in the floor,Wolff 1962, p. 89: "President Truman thought it inappropriate for the President's Seal to be placed on the floor of the hall, where visitors would walk across it." and had the bronze seal moved to the ground floor above the entrance to the Diplomatic Reception Room. In place of the bronze seal in the floor, Truman had a polychrome

Polychrome

Polychrome is one of the terms used to describe the use of multiple colors in one entity. It has also been defined as "The practice of decorating architectural elements, sculpture, etc., in a variety of colors." Polychromatic light is composed of a number of different wavelengths...

painted plaster seal installed above the entrance to the Blue Room

Blue Room (White House)

The Blue Room is one of three state parlors on the first floor in the White House, the residence of the president of the United States. It is distinct for its oval shape. The room is used for receptions, receiving lines, and is occasionally set for small dinners...

Use over time

When the White House interiors were first completed during the administration of John Adams

John Adams

John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...

the house was primarily entered from a temporary wooden piazza on the south. President Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

used the Entrance Hall as a "Cabinet of Natural History" displaying finds from the Lewis and Clark Expedition

Lewis and Clark Expedition

The Lewis and Clark Expedition, or ″Corps of Discovery Expedition" was the first transcontinental expedition to the Pacific Coast by the United States. Commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson and led by two Virginia-born veterans of Indian wars in the Ohio Valley, Meriwether Lewis and William...

.

In the 20th century the Entrance Hall has been used for official welcomes, receiving lines, small concerts, and dancing. Actor John Travolta

John Travolta

John Joseph Travolta is an American actor, dancer and singer. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after appearing on the television series Welcome Back, Kotter and starring in the box office successes Saturday Night Fever and Grease...

danced with Diana, Princess of Wales

Diana, Princess of Wales

Diana, Princess of Wales was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales, whom she married on 29 July 1981, and an international charity and fundraising figure, as well as a preeminent celebrity of the late 20th century...

in 1985; in 1998 First Lady

First Lady of the United States

First Lady of the United States is the title of the hostess of the White House. Because this position is traditionally filled by the wife of the president of the United States, the title is most often applied to the wife of a sitting president. The current first lady is Michelle Obama.-Current:The...

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is the 67th United States Secretary of State, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama. She was a United States Senator for New York from 2001 to 2009. As the wife of the 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, she was the First Lady of the...

danced here with Czech President

President of the Czech Republic

The President of the Czech Republic is the head of state of the Czech Republic. Unlike his counterparts in Austria and Hungary, who are generally considered figureheads, the Czech President has a considerable role in political affairs...

Václav Havel

Václav Havel is a Czech playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and politician. He was the tenth and last President of Czechoslovakia and the first President of the Czech Republic . He has written over twenty plays and numerous non-fiction works, translated internationally...

Furnishings

On the west wall of the room is a gilded

Gilding

The term gilding covers a number of decorative techniques for applying fine gold leaf or powder to solid surfaces such as wood, stone, or metal to give a thin coating of gold. A gilded object is described as "gilt"...

beech

Beech

Beech is a genus of ten species of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia and North America.-Habit:...

French Empire

Empire (style)

The Empire style, , sometimes considered the second phase of Neoclassicism, is an early-19th-century design movement in architecture, furniture, other decorative arts, and the visual arts followed in Europe and America until around 1830, although in the U. S. it continued in popularity in...

pier table (c. 1812) by cabinetmaker Pierre-Antoine Bellange

Pierre-Antoine Bellange

Pierre-Antoine Bellangé was a French ébéniste working in Paris. Bellangé held an eminent position among the representatives of the decorative arts at the beginning of the nineteenth century. He gained his master craftsman title on October 24, 1788...

purchased for the Blue Room

Blue Room (White House)

by President James Monroe

James Monroe

James Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...

. On the pier table is an ormolu

Ormolu

Ormolu is an 18th-century English term for applying finely ground, high-karat gold in a mercury amalgam to an object of bronze. The mercury is driven off in a kiln...

French Empire mantel clock

A French Empire-style mantel clock, is a type of elaborately decorated mantel clock made in France over the Napoleonic Empire between 1804–1814/15, although the clocks manufactured throughout the Bourbon Restoration are also included within this art movement because they share subject, decorative...

featuring a sculpture of Minerva

Minerva

Minerva was the Roman goddess whom Romans from the 2nd century BC onwards equated with the Greek goddess Athena. She was the virgin goddess of poetry, medicine, wisdom, commerce, weaving, crafts, magic...

. This clock was manufactured by the bronzier Pierre-Philippe Thomire

Pierre-Philippe Thomire

Pierre-Philippe Thomire a French sculptor, was the most prominent bronzier, or producer of ornamental patinated and gilt-bronze objects and furniture mounts of the First French Empire...

and also bought by Monroe, it was previously located in the Blue Room.

In the southeast and southwest corners of the Entrance Hall are crimson

Crimson

Crimson is a strong, bright, deep red color. It is originally the color of the dye produced from a scale insect, Kermes vermilio, but the name is now also used as a generic term for those slightly bluish-red colors that are between red and rose; besides crimson itself, these colors include...

and gold upholstered French Empire banquettes acquired by interior design

Interior design

Interior design describes a group of various yet related projects that involve turning an interior space into an effective setting for the range of human activities are to take place there. An interior designer is someone who conducts such projects...

er Stéphane Boudin

Stéphane Boudin

Stéphane Boudin was a French interior designer and a president of Maison Jansen, the influential Paris-based interior decorating firm.Boudin is best known for being asked by U.S...

of Maison Jansen

Maison Jansen

Maison Jansen was a Paris-based interior decoration office founded in 1880 by Dutch-born Jean-Henri Jansen and continuing in practice until 1989...

during the John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

administration. The McKim era bronze torchères remain in the room. A pair of Louis XVI torcheres flank the door leading to the North Portico. A pair of armchairs commissioned for the Blue Room in 1902 and based on a suite of chairs designed by Jacob-Desmalter

François-Honoré-Georges Jacob-Desmalter

François-Honoré-Georges Jacob-Desmalter oversaw one of the most successful and influential furniture workshops in Paris, from 1796 to 1825...

in the Salon des Fleurs of at Château de Compiègne

Château de Compiègne

The Castle of Compiègne is a French château, a royal residence built for Louis XV and restored by Napoleon. Compiègne was one of three seats of royal government, the others being Versailles and Fontainebleau...

are placed on the North wall.

External links

White House website for the Entrance and Cross Hall
White House Museum's Entrance Hall page, with many additional historical pictures

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