Part 4(d) – The Unbuilt Summer-House, Washington, D.C.

Posted on by Darrin M. VonStein

A: Location of the Summer-house. B: Location for the unbuilt Summer-house.

With the completion of the Summerhouse in the spring of 1881, Frederick Law Olmsted began planning a second Summer-house which was to be located on a similar triangular plot on the southwest of the Capitol grounds. While the north Summer-house had its water sourced from the Capitol’s cooling system, the south Summer-house was to be be fed from a natural, underground spring forming a small pond around which the structure would be erected.

Drawings from https://www.aoc.gov/explore-capitol-campus/blog/olmsteds-never-built-retreat-south-summerhouse

In 1879, the year he designed the first Summer-house, Thomas Wisedell had also built a house in Yonkers, NY and formed a partnership with Francis Kimball (1843-1919). By 1881, the firm of Kimball & Wisedell had established themselves principally a theatre architects. It is unknown if Wisedell was able to actually design the second Summer-house in Washington, D.C. and the correspondence between Olmsted and Wisedell at that time seemed to focus on Wisedell’s ill health and Olmsted’s pushing to get drawings sent to Washington. Also, most of the letters between the two men were sent from Springfield, Massachusetts where Wisedell was busy overseeing the remodeling of Gilmore’s Opera House, one the firms largest commissions.

What seemed to doom the project, however, was neither Wisedell’s illness nor his work load, but the fact that the first Summer-house was rather unpopular with enough Senators (criticism that waned over the next few years as the plantings around the Summer-house matured) that when Olmsted submitted his budget for the 1882-83 fiscal year, it was the only item that was not approved.

Though there has been mild (mild might be an overstatement) interest in constructing the second Summer-house, it is quite doubtful.

Further Reading:

  • Allen, William C., History of the United States Capitol: a Chronicle of Design, Construction and Politics (Washington, D.C.: The Government Printing Office, 2001).
  • Annual Reports of the Architect of the United States Capitol (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1880-1883).
  • Documentary History of the Construction and Development of the United Stated Capitol Building and Grounds (Washington, D.C.: The Government Printing Office, 1904).
  • The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted. Volume VII: Parks, Politics and Patronage 1874-1882 (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007).
  • The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted. Volume VIII: The Early Boston Years 1882-1890 (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013).
  • Brown, Glenn, History of the United States Capitol vols. I and II (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1900, 1903).

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