It was designed by American architect John Russell Pope and built in 1920 for Ambassador Irwin B. Laughlin, who filled it with his extensive collection of French paintings and Oriental porcelain.

After a long career with the US Foreign Service, Laughlin retired in 1919 and built Meridian House, filling it with his collection of 18th-century French drawings and Oriental porcelains and screens.

It cannot from its nature do otherwise than set a standard which should endure permanently.After undergoing a major renovation in 1994, Meridian House's principal rooms retain their architectural detail as well as some of the original decorative features, such as the 18th-century European overdoor paintings and antique brass hardware and lighting fixtures.

The wrought-iron and marble-topped side tables, the four Waterford crystal torcheres in the corners, the blue Chinese temple jars, and the antique clock and barometer on the mirrored walls are all part of the original furnishings.

A Latin inscription, "Quo habitat felicitas nil intret mali", appears over the front door and translates "Where happiness dwells, evil will not enter."

Another inscription, over the rear courtyard doors, reads: "Purior hic aer: late hinc conspectus in urbem," meaning "Purer here the air whence we overlook the city," a quotation also inscribed on a house at the top of Rome's Spanish Steps.