L’Enfant’s Washington: the figure of the President in the capital of the Republic

Pierre L’Enfant’s plan for the permanent seat of government on the banks of the Potomac River was completed in 1791. Evidence of L’Enfant’s intentions is limited and the documentation of the debate surrounding its organisation, surprisingly small. However, an examination of the plan, and its correlation with the existing topography and surrounding landscape yields new evidence related to the structure of the most significant axes of the new city. This paper demonstrates the central role of the figure of the President to the location of key buildings and the orientation of avenues. It examines the creation of the persona of George Washington as part of a republican tradition of heroic virtue and explores the extent to which the adoption of a symbolic structure associated with kingship was reconciled with the republican ideals of the new nation. This work questions received ideas as to the distribution of and location of significant institutions and the sequence of design ideas that informed the 1791 plan. More importantly, it embeds Washington, D.C. in a wider history of urbanism as a key location for the early embodiment of American ceremonial life and an early example of structured civic space