The United States Capitol building in Washington D.C. is one of the most symbolically important and architecturally impressive buildings in the nation, housing Congress for over two centuries. It is situated on Capitol Hill and built in a neoclassical style with a white exterior and central dome. Construction began in 1793 and has undergone several phases, with the current building spanning over four acres with approximately 540 rooms.

1. U. S. CAPITOL BUILDING, WASHINGTON D.C.
 The most symbolically important and
architecturally impressive buildings in the nation.
It has housed the meeting chambers of the house
of representatives and the senate for two
centuries. The capitol, which was started in 1793,
has been through many construction phases.
 It is situated on capitol hill at the eastern end of
Pennsylvania avenue. The Washington monument
and the Lincoln memorial lie to the west, and the
supreme court and the library of congress lie to
the east.
 The cornerstone was laid by president Washington
on September 18, 1793. The north wing,
containing the senate chamber, was completed
first, and congress convened there in November
1800. The south wing, containing the chamber of
the house of representatives, was completed in
1807.
 DESIGN-
 Today this stately five-level building with its approximately 540
rooms sprawls across some four acres (1.6 smaller two wings
(inner north) and inner south) containing the two original smaller
meeting chambers for the senate and the house of representatives
(between 1800 and late 1850s) and then flanked by two further
extended (newer) wings, one also for each chamber of the larger,
more populous congress:
 The new north wing is the senate chamber and the new south wing
is the house of representatives chamber.
 The capitol houses vast historic art and statuary collections.
 The capitol is built in a distinctive neoclassical style and has a white
exterior. Both its east and west elevations are formally referred to
as fronts, though only the east front was intended for the reception
of visitors and dignitaries.
 A marble duplicate of the sandstone east front was built 33.5 feet
(10.2 m) from the old front.
 Entry was made through the massive sculpted Columbus doors,
through a small narthex cramped with security, and thence directly
into the rotunda.
 The capitol's building is marked by its central dome above a
rotunda in the central section of the structure.
 Above these newer chambers are galleries where visitors can watch
the senate and house of representatives.
 On the ground floor is an area known as the crypt. It was intended
to be the burial place of George Washington, with a ringed
balustrade at the center of the rotunda above looking down to his
tomb.
 In order to provide more space for the increasing numbers of legislators from new states, in 1850 congress
approved a competition for a design to expand both wings of the capitol. The winner, the Philadelphia architect
Thomas unstick Walter, finished the extension of the south wing in 1857 and the north wing in 1859.
 The major architectural change to the capitol during Walter's tenure was the replacement of the old Bulfinch
dome with a 287-foot- (87-metre-) high cast-iron dome. On December 2, 1863, freedom, a bronze statue 19.5
feet (6 meters) high by Thomas Crawford, was installed on top of the dome‟s crowning cupola.
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 The hall of columns is located on the house side of the capitol,
home to twenty-eight fluted columns and statues from the national
statuary hall collection.
 In the basement of the capitol building in a utility room are two
marble bathtubs, which are all that remain of the once elaborate
senate baths.
 The house of representatives chamber has 448 permanent seats.
 The capitol grounds cover approximately 274 acres (1.11 km²),
with the grounds proper consisting mostly of lawns, walkways,
streets, drives, and planting areas.
 The current grounds were designed by noted American landscape
architect Frederick law Olmsted.
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DOME-
• Constantino Brumidi‟s allegorical fresco „apotheosis of Washington
(1865)‟, which depicts gods and goddesses intermingled with
Washington and other American heroes, adorns the ceiling‟s dome.
• The 1850 expansion more than doubled the length of the capitol,
dwarfing the original, timber-framed, copper-sheeted, low dome of
1818, designed by Charles Bulfinch and no longer in proportion with
the increased size of the building. In 1855, the decision was made
to tear it down and replace it with the "wedding-cake style" cast-
iron dome that stands today.
• Walter's dome is double, with a large oculus in the inner dome,
through which is seen "the apotheosis of Washington" painted on a
shell suspended from the supporting ribs.
• The weight of the cast iron for the dome has been published as
8,909,200 pounds (4,041,100 kg).
• The dome rises to 289 feet (88 m). The statue on top of the dome
is the "statue of freedom“
• The interiors decorating the walls are animals, insects and natural
flora indigenous to the united states
• "The apotheosis of Washington" was painted beneath the top of the
dome,.

3. UNITED STATES CAPITOL
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BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY
ARCHITECT- CHARLES FOLLEN MCKIM, MEAD AND WHITE
LOCATION- BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
DATE- 1887- 1895
STYLE- NEO CLASSICAL (RENAISSANCE REVIVAL)
CONSTRUCTION- BEARING MASONRY, STONE
 It is the largest municipal public library in the united states. The library officially opened to the public in 1854..
 The building had been built more for its artistic architectural grandeur than for its functionality as a library.
THE MCKIM BUILDING-
 This building included a children's room, the first in the nation, and a sculpture garden in its central
courtyard surrounded by an arcaded gallery in the manner of a renaissance cloister.
 The library presents a façade reminiscent of palazzo Della Chancelleria, a sixteenth century Italian palace in
Rome. The arcaded windows of its façade look alike to the side elevations of Alberti's Tempio Malatestiano,
Rimini, the first fully renaissance building.
 The three central bays are subtly emphasized without breaking the rhythm. The library also represents one
of the first major applications in the united states of thin tile vaults. Seven different types of guastavino
vaulting can be seen in the Boston Public Library.
 Mckim incorporated the new design process of “tile vaulting” as a method to fireproof his new library
building.
 Additional extraordinary architectural features included a grand marble staircase flanked by statutes of two
lions sculpted by the artist Louis St. Gaudens
MONUMENTAL INSCRIPTIONS-
 Architect Charles Follen Mckim chose to have monumental inscriptions, similar to those found on basilicas
and monuments in ancient Rome, in the entablature on each of the main building's three façades.
Courtyard of the Mckim Building looking north. The campanile of old south church can be seen.
THE JOHNSON BUILDING-
 Designed by Philip Johnson, a late modernist addition was built in 1967-1971 and opened in 1972. The
Johnson building reflects similar proportions, and is built of the same pink granite as the Mckim building.
 Bates hall features a majestic barrel-arched ceiling enclosed by half domes on each end, english oak
bookcases, busts of eminent authors and Bostonians, and a richly carved limestone balcony.
THE CHAVANNES GALLERY-
 Painted by the renowned French artist Pierre Puvis De Chavannes, exquisite murals adorn the walls, grand
staircase and second floor gallery.
THE ABBEY ROOM-
 Murals titled the "quest of the holy grail," by American artist, Edwin
Austin Abbey, grace the walls of the abbey room on the second floor of
the Mckim building. The murals are composed of a series of 15 panels
featuring 150 life-sized figures illustrating the Arthurian legend.
 The room also features a beautiful fireplace of French rouge antique
marble, dark oak wainscoting, and a beamed ceiling.
BATES HALL-
 Bates hall is named for the library's first great benefactor, Joshua
bates.
 The form of bates hall, rectilinear but terminated with a hemi-
circular apse on each end, is reminiscent of a roman basilica.
 A series of robust double coffers in the ceiling provide a sculptural
canopy to the room. The east side has a rhythmic series of arched
windows with light buffered by wide overhanging hood on the
exterior.
 Heavy deep green silk velvet drapery installed in 1888, and again in
the 1920s and 1950s was not recreated in the 1993 restoration of
the room. The drapery helped to muffle sound and lower light
levels.
 Bates hall has a coffered ceiling in a wide catena-arched barrel
vault. Internet and power connections are discreetly beneath the
large wooden research tables.

4. NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
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NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
DATE- 1911
STYLE- BEAUX ARTS
ARCHITECT- CARRERE AND HASTINGS
CONSTRUCTION- STONE
 One of the world's greatest libraries, the NYPL was formed in 1895 by combing the Astor, Lenox
and Tilden libraries. This was previously the site of the croton distributing reservoir, a massive tank
holding water from the croton river, completed in 1842. The base of the reservoir serves today as
the library's foundation.
 Following a competition among the city's most prominent architects, the relatively unknown firm of
Carrere and Hastings was selected to design and construct the building. The result, a beaux-arts
design, was the largest marble structure up to that time in the united states.
 The cornerstone was laid in may 1902, but work progressed slowly on the project, which
eventually cost $9 million. In 1910, 75 miles of shelves were installed, and it took a year to move
and install the books that were in the Astor and Lenox libraries.
 Two famous stone lions guarding the entrance were sculpted by Edward Clark potter. The main
reading room of the research library (room 315) — a majestic 78 feet (23.8 m) wide by 297 feet
(90.5 m) long, with 52 feet (15.8 m) high ceilings.
 Lit by massive windows and grand chandeliers; furnished with sturdy wood
tables, comfortable chairs, and brass lamps.
 In the 1980s the central research library added more than 125,000 square
feet (12,000 m²) of space, this expansion required a major construction
project in which Bryant park, directly west of the library, was closed to the
public and excavated. The new library facilities were built below ground level
and the park was restored above it.
 Marble on the library building is about three feet thick, and the building is
Vermont marble and brick all the way through. The exterior is 20,000 blocks of
stone, each one numbered in preparation for a renovation announced in 2007.
It stretches 390 feet along fifth avenue.
 Before the end pavilions are flagpoles, whose sculpted bronze bases designed
by Thomas Hastings.
 In may 2014, one of the "gilded-plaster rosettes" in the ceiling of the rose
main reading room fell to the floor 50 feet below.
 Walking in through the doors into the enormous welcoming vestibule, you
would stand at the front door and you would be overwhelmed by the grandeur
of the space that you were in, but if you looked straight ahead you looked
through a public gallery to a door in the distance. And that door led into the
book stacks.
 Walking into the great marble lobby and the main public rooms are either the
gallery on the first floor or the catalogue and reading rooms which were placed
on the third floor. And they were placed up there on purpose so that they
could get the most amount of natural light, and that they would be farthest
from the noisy street.
 Typical of a beaux-arts building is it's filled with allegorical sculpture that says
something about the use of the building. There are fountains flanking the
entrance that are symbols of truth and beauty.
 Above the entrance there are statues representing poetry and romance and
history.