Thomas Jefferson, the Classical World, and Early America

Thomas Jefferson’s Classical Architecture: An American Agenda

2 99 T homas jefferson’s employment of classical forms and details was part of his agenda to reform American architecture. He stated the problem in Notes on the State of Virginia: “The genius of architecture seems to have shed its maledictions over this land. . . . The first principles of the art are unknown, and there exists scarcely a model among us sufficiently chaste to give an idea of them.” Writing in the early 1780s just as Independence had been achieved, Jefferson bemoaned that “a workman could scarcely be found here capable of drawing an order.”1 A few years later, Jefferson explained his design for the Virginia State Capitol to James Madison: “But how is a taste in this beautiful art to be formed in our countrymen, unless we avail ourselves of every occasion when public buildings are to be erected, of presenting to them models for their study and imitation?” To this end, he submitted, in conjunction with Charles-Louis Clèrisseau, a design for the Richmond Statehouse based upon a Roman temple dating from 16 bc, the Maison Carrée in Nîmes, France.Hisdescriptionoverflowedwithpraise:“oneofthemostbeautiful,ifnot the most beautiful and precious morsel of architecture left us by antiquity. . . . It is noble beyond expression, and would have done honour to our country as presenting to travellers a morsel of taste in our infancy promising much for our maturer age.” 2 Obsessive might describe Jefferson’s interest in architecture; he once claimed, “Architecture is my delight, and putting up and pulling down one of my favorite amusements.”3 Monticello, which he described as “My essay in Architecture ,” existed for much of his life as a construction zone as he redesigned Thomas Jefferson’s Classical Architecture An American Agenda richard guy wilson Figure 1. Richmond: Virginia Capitol, end elevation. Drawing by Thomas Jefferson, 1785. Original manuscript from the Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, N279, K116. (Courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical Society) Figure 2. Front façade of Maison Carrée, Nîmes, Charles-Louis Clèrisseau. From Clèrisseau, Antiquités de la France (Paris, 1778). (Courtesy of Special Collections, University of Virginia Library) and rebuilt it.4 When Jefferson relocated, whether to Philadelphia, New York, or Paris, he remodeled the interiors and sometimes the gardens of his rented quarters .5 In addition to his own houses and their interiors, furnishings, and gardens, thestatecapitol,andtheUniversityofVirginia,Jeffersondesignedorcontributed to at least eight other houses in the Piedmont area of Virginia, several courthouses , and a variety of other buildings. All of these display his knowledge and his inventiveness with the forms and details of classical architecture. Buildings, as Jefferson knew, had a purely practical element—they provided shelter and were functional structures—but they could also inspire and Thomas Jefferson’s Classical Architecture 101 102 Richard Guy Wilson convey identity. He wrote to James Madison that the classical Virginia state house would “improve the taste of my countrymen, to increase their reputation, to reconcile them to the rest of the world, and procure them its praise.”6 Jefferson ’s architectural accomplishments were many, but perhaps his most important lies with the establishment of an American architectural identity rooted in the classical architecture of Europe. An understanding of Jefferson’s employment of classical architecture can be approached by an examination of three issues : the sources of his knowledge and training; his usage of classicism; and the meanings that his buildings convey. Sources of Knowledge and Training Jefferson is sometimes described a “gentleman,” or “amateur,” architect, implying he lacked proper training. However, architecture schools did not exist in Jefferson’s time. The first American school of architecture was the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, established in 1865–67. Abroad, there were no schools in England (the first proper school was founded in 1904), while France had a very small academy, controlled by the monarchy, that in the early nineteenth century evolved into the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Professional architects were very rare in the colonies and young republic. Most architects emerged from the ranks of builders, and training came through apprenticeship . A few apprentice-trained architects immigrated, such as Benjamin Henry Latrobe, who arrived from England in 1796 and became a friend of Jefferson ’s. Jefferson learned about architecture from friends such as Latrobe and others, and through books, travel, and the process of construction. Consultation with other architects assisted Jefferson in learning about architecture . While in Paris, he engaged Clèrisseau to...