George Washington, Architect – Allan Carl Greenberg

Soldier, statesman, gentleman farmer, nation builder. More than two centuries after George Washington retired from office and quietly returned to his Virginia estate, his accomplishments continue to evoke an outpouring of biographies, chronicles, and critiques. One talent has been overlooked, however. In George Washington, Architect, Allan Greenberg explores the first president's innovations as a designer of buildings and landscapes. Quoting from primary documents, including Washington's correspondence and journals, Greenberg reveals that Washington was an exemplary form-giver whose best work was conducted in his own back yards: Mount Vernon and Washington, D.C. In the first part of this volume Greenberg reveals how Washington not only redesigned the exterior and interior of his mansion at Mount Vernon, one of the best loved landmarks in the United States, but also sculpted the terrain, rearranged vistas, designed farm buildings with innovative shapes and features, and created one of the most beautiful American gardens. Even as he led the Continental Army, he directed the day-to-day management of his estate. From the selection of plantings to experiments in threshing, his designs revealed a brilliant gift for efficiency and harmony. The second part concerns a broader arena for experimentation: the new capital of the United States itself. Designed in 1791 by Washington's handpicked choice of planner, Peter Charles Lé Enfant, Washington, D.C. symbolically expresses the principles of the first democratic federal republic in history. Breaking with European design precedents to suggest a break with autocratic European systems of government, the new capital, Greenberg argues, was the material form democracy assumed. George Washington, Architect explores the construction of a nation, a city, a house, and a farm as a unified activity directed by a single - and singular - genius.