Amid the ongoing and highly contested renovations to the East Wing, the new head of the federal arts commission is hoping to please the president with new plans to replace the White House’s iconic columns with something flashier.
Trump appointed Rodney Mims Cook, Jr. to be the new chairman of the federal Commission of Fine Arts at the end of January. The chairman told The Washington Post in a story published Sunday that he is proposing to replace the columns adorning the White House’s entrance to match Trump’s design preferences.
The current columns are Ionic, which are slender and feature an elegant scroll-like capital. Cook wants to change them to Corinthian columns, which are more ornate and align with the president’s gaudier style.
The Ionic columns are over 200 years old, with those on the North portico completed in 1830 under Andrew Jackson. The proposed change to the far more ornate Corinthian columns has prompted further concerns about the historic preservation of the White House.
Trump has already come under fire for destroying the East Wing of the building with his flashy, expensive ballroom project.
There do not appear to be set plans for the column renovation, as Cook told The Washington Post that he has not discussed the changes with the president.
“Corinthian is the highest order [of column], and that’s what our other two branches of government have,” he told the outlet. “Why the White House didn’t originally use them, at least on the north front, which is considered the front door, is beyond me.”
The Daily Beast reached out to the Commission of Fine Arts and the White House for comment.
A White House spokesperson told The Washington Post that there were no current plans to replace the Ionic columns, although they affirmed that Corinthian is Trump’s favorite kind of column.
Corinthian columns are featured on the U.S. Capitol and Supreme Court buildings. They are also a prominent feature at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida.
A number of architects have expressed fears over the current administration’s attacks on the federal government’s tradition of design. One told The Washington Post that replacing the columns would undermine the White House’s history as the “People’s House.”
Trump has already demolished the East Wing to make way for a flashy Mar-a-Lago-style ballroom that has quickly ballooned in cost. While the project was initially expected to cost $200 million, the president let it slip in December that the price tag had increased to $400 million.
Over 32,000 people have sent notes to the National Capital Planning Commission, which is overseeing the ballroom’s construction, to weigh in on the renovation. About 97% of the comments analyzed by CNN were in opposition to the project.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt previously told The Daily Beast that “nasty comments are clearly stemming from an organized campaign of Trump deranged liberals who clearly have no style or taste.”
Meanwhile, the National Trust for Historic Preservation filed a new lawsuit against the Trump administration after its previous suit was thrown out by a judge. The new suit alleges that the president violates the Constitutional separation of powers by demolishing the East Wing and proceeding with the construction of the ballroom without Congressional authorization.
