Delusions of Grandeur: A Bigger Golder White House

The Hermitage in St. Petersburg

By James S. Russell

The request to architects and builders competing to design the White House in the late 18th century asked for “a grandeur of conception, Republican simplicity, and … true elegance of proportion.” That simple phrase embodies tensions that have been debated since the building was occupied in 1800. The relative modesty—even austerity—of the White House in its original form as an Irish country house by architect James Hoban bespeaks the lack of wealth the nation possessed when it was completed in 1800 but also was symbolic of the role played by an executive elected by the populous who served at the pleasure of the voters. Having thrown off the shackles of monarchy, Americans had no desire to emulate the self-important extravagance of those empires’ seats of power.

There has always been pressure to enlarge the White House or make it grander as America gained in power and wealth and as the structure of government became more complex. Even relatively small changes have been controversial and deemed inappropriately extravagant, though. Deference to the modesty of the house’s early iterations has largely prevailed.

A president who treats the people who elected him as subjects who must pay fealty and obey him in all things is trying to will into existence a kingly seat of power. It’s just a ballroom, the minions argue, though the wing is about 1.75 times larger than the White House itself.

A speed walk through the White House’s architectural history shows just how disruptive this project actually is but also how it is a building block in the authoritarian edifice Trump and the radical-right elite is creating to turn his increasingly chaotic utterances into a new era of colonialist empire.

https://www.postalley.org/2026/02/26/delusions-of-grandeur-a-bigger-golder-white-house/