East Room

The East Room is an events and reception room in the White House, the home of the President of the United States. The largest room in the Executive Mansion, it is used for dances, receptions, press conferences, ceremonies, concerts, and banquets. The East Room was one of the last rooms to be finished and decorated, and it has undergone substantial redecoration over the past two centuries. Since 1964, the Committee for the Preservation of the White House has, by executive order, advised the President of the United States and First Lady of the United States on the decor, preservation, and conservation of the East Room and other public rooms at the White House.

The White House was designed by architect James Hoban. Leinster House in Ireland was the main inspiration for the White House, and includes a large east room which may have inspired Hoban's East Room. But the newly added Large Dining Room at Mount Vernon may also have been a source for the design of the East Room. As his drawings of the second and third floor do not exist, it is unclear what use Hoban intended for the room. It is possible that Hoban intended it for use as a private gallery for the family. It was the largest room in the White House, however, about 80 by 37 feet (24 by 11 m) in size with a 22-foot-high (6.7 m) ceiling. The middle window in the north wall was designed to provide access to a terrace (never built).

The East Room was first assigned a purpose in 1807. Architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe had been brought to the capital by Thomas Jefferson, who made him commissioner of public buildings. Latrobe surveyed the White House in 1803, and architectural drawings of the building (produced in 1807) are the earliest extant plans now known. On his sketches, Latrobe comments "Public Audience chamber entirely unfinished, the ceiling has given way." Latrobe also proposed sealing the windows on the east side of the room based on an architectural theory about natural light. But this change was not made.

The East Room was among the last rooms on the State Floor to be completed and used. The White House was unfinished when President John Adams occupied it between 1797 and 1801. His wife, Abigail Adams, hung laundry in the bare East Room to dry. Although much of the White House was finished and decorated during Adams administration, the East Room was not. The room's lone artwork was a copy of the Lansdowne portrait depicting George Washington, painted by Gilbert Stuart in 1797. It was purchased by the White House in 1800, and hung in the East Room. (Rescued from the 1814 fire, it still hangs there, with a companion portrait of Martha Washington painted by Eliphalet Frazer Andrews in 1878.) There was extensive feeling in Congress that Adams had adopted too many of the trappings of monarchy, and Congress declined to appropriate funds to finish the room for fear it would look too much like a throne room. During the Jefferson administration, 38 gold-and-black painted chairs were purchased and placed in the room, but little else is known of the room's furnishings prior to 1814. Jefferson also had the East Room partitioned (using canvas and sailcloth for walls) and the southern end used for a bedroom and office for Meriwether Lewis and Lewis Harvie (both Private Secretary to the President).

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