East Room
[3][12] Jefferson's successor, James Madison, sought to make the partitions permanent and asked Latrobe to design bedrooms and office space across the southern part of the room.
[17] Federal style furniture, made by Georgetown craftsman William King Jr., was added to the East Room by President James Monroe in 1818.
[4] Decorative wooden beams were added to the ceiling,[35] and two of the east-facing windows were blocked off and fireplaces with black Italian marble mantelpieces installed in their place.
[44] At some point prior to the inauguration of President William Henry Harrison in March 1841, the East Room acquired eight floor-to-ceiling mirrors with broad, heavily carved frames.
[54][42] The wallpaper was heavy patterned velvet cloth paper from Paris in crimson, garnet, and gold,[42][55] and supplied by William H. Carryl & Brother of New York.
Architects Orville Babcock (Commissioner of Public Buildings and Grounds), Richard Ezdorf, William J. McPherson, and Alfred Mullett were faced with both a decorative and structural task.
[68][67] White-painted carved paneling with Greek Revival designs;[68][67] massive, low-hanging, cut-glass chandeliers (replacing those which had hung since 1834);[69] pearl gray and gilt wallpaper,[67] and wall-to-wall carpeting in a floral pattern completed the redecoration.
[74] President Chester A. Arthur hired the Washington, D.C., firm of W. B. Moses & Son to redecorate much of the White House in 1881, including the East Room.
It was supplied by W. H. Houghton & Co. of Washington, D.C.[78] Cleveland's successor, Benjamin Harrison, refurbished most of the State Floor rooms again in 1891 after the White House was wired for electricity.
[86] The central section of the ceiling was decorated with a large plaster panel featuring an intricate medallion flanked by swags, acanthus, escutcheons, and scrollwork.
Marcotte and Co. supplied heavy velvet gold drapes, and topped each window with carved and gilded cornices of the company's own design.
[104] The problem, not rectified until 1952, was that the interior walls rested on brick columns in the basement, which themselves were sitting on loose rubble footings atop soft soil.
[107] During Roosevelt's term, the government of France donated Limoges porcelain busts of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Benjamin Franklin to the White House.
But by late 1951, with the White House renovation months behind, costs soaring, and President Truman demanding that the work be sped up, workers found it easier to machine new pieces than restore old wood.
[84] To cut costs, the replacement entablature was made of a composite glue and sawdust mixture pressed into forms rather than carved from wood.
[129] Red marble mantels were installed, and the remaining Venetian window in the room was narrowed to help create the "American" feel.
Her renovation was overseen by American antiques autodidact Henry Francis du Pont and French interior designer Stéphane Boudin and his company, Maison Jansen.
[147] Made of a custom-manufactured gold and cream silk lampas, the fabric contained a non-repetitive design of birds, butterflies, cupids, flowers, medallions, roosters, and wheat and featured heavy fringe at the bottom.
[149][q] Instead, gold lampas, trimmed with braid and hemmed with gilt, spun-metal twisted fringe at the bottom, was installed in flat panels from behind each cornice.
She initially considered modified versions of ashtrays seen at the home of her friend, Bunny Mellon, but rejected this idea in favor of a unique design.
[140] Twenty were eventually manufactured[143] out of dark wood by White House carpenters, although the gray granite tops for the Kennedy-designed ashtrays were made by Jansen at a cost of $310.
[138] Research conducted by White House Curator Lorraine Waxman Pearce and Jacqueline Kennedy identified the four Monroe-era candelabra (which had been moved), and restored them to the mantels in the room's southern wall.
[143] Kennedy's friend, Jayne Wrightsman, donated two early 19th-century wall sconces, which were wired for electricity by White House staff and hung on either side of the center window.
[152] Designed by ballet impresario Lincoln Kirstein[152][153] and constructed by White House carpenters,[152] the stage was clad in red velvet,[152][153] small, and easily portable.
Additional seating was provided by cushioned bentwood chairs with canework backs (which had long been owned by the White House but whose provenance was unclear).
Woven by Edward Fields Inc. of New York and paid for with private donations raised by the White House Endowment Fund, the carpets were designed to cover most of the floor to protect it from dirt and the occasional pebble stuck in the tread of a shoe.
The Kennedy-era Empire-style gold draperies were replaced with nearly identical ones, but the swags were made 12 inches (30 cm) deeper to make them appear more substantial.
[160] The East Room is used for a wide range of events, which include the swearing-in of Cabinet members and justices of the Supreme Court, press conferences, the signing of legislation, receptions for foreign dignitaries.
[s] Presidential funerary events held in the East Room comprise: In addition to Presidents, several members of First Families have died while living in the White House.
Initially, the United States Secret Service reported that Gonzalez, who jumped the fence at the North Lawn and raced to the mansion, had only gotten a few steps into the Entrance Hall.
