goldendragon1971

Monday, May 4, 2015

The inspiration behind DC's tallest building is from ancient Egypt...........

Ancient Egyptian architecture inspired the design of the Washington Monument.

The Washington Monument

Cornerstone Laid: July 4, 1848
Structural Construction Complete: December 6, 1884
Dedication Ceremony: February 21, 1885
Officially Opened: October 9, 1888
Style: Egyptian Revival
Architect: Robert Mills; Redesigned by Lt. Colonel Thomas Casey (US Army Corps of Engineers)
Height: 554 feet 7-11/32 inches* (169.046 meters*)
Dimensions: 55 feet 1-1/2 inches (16.80 m) each side at the base, tapering to 34 feet 5-5/8 inches (10.5 m) at 500 feet level (top of shaft and bottom of pyramid); the foundation is reportedly 80 feet by 80 feet
Weight: 81,120 tons
Wall Thickness: From 15 feet (4.6 m) at bottom to 18 inches (460 mm) at the top
Construction Materials: Stone masonry -- white marble (Maryland and Massachusetts), Texas marble, Maryland blue gneiss, granite (Maine), and sandstone
Number of Blocks: 36,491
Number of US Flags: 50 flags (one for each state) encircle the base

* NOTE: Height recalculations were released in 2015. See the NOAA Study Uses Latest Tech to Compute Updated Washington Monument Height and 2013-2014 Survey of the Washington Monument [accessed February 17, 2015]

Learn About the Washington Monument:

Architect Robert Mills initial design honored America's first president, George Washington, with a 600-foot (183 m) tall, square, flat-topped pillar. At the base of the pillar, Mills envisioned an elaborate colonnade with statues of thirty Revolutionary War heroes and a soaring sculpture of George Washington in a chariot. Learn more about the original design for the Washington Monument.

To build Robert Mills' monument would have cost over a million dollars (more than $21 million in modern dollars). Plans for the colonnade were postponed and eventually eliminated. The Washington Monument evolved into a simple, tapered stone obelisk topped with a geometric pyramid. The pyramid shape of the monument was inspired byancient Egyptian architecture.

Political strife, the Civil War, and money shortages delayed construction on the Washington Monument.

Because of interruptions, the stones are not all the same shade. Part way up, at 150 feet (45 m), the masonry blocks are a slightly different color. Thirty years passed before the monument was completed in 1884. At that time, the Washington Monument was the tallest structure in the world. It's still the tallest structure in Washington D.C.

Renovations at the Washington Monument:

In 1999, the Washington Monument faced extensive renovations. Postmodernist architectMichael Graves surrounded the monument with distinctive scaffolding made from 37 miles of aluminum tubing. The scaffolding took four months to erect and became a tourist attraction in itself.

Earthquake Damage at the Washington Monument:

Twelve years later, in August 23, 2011, masonry cracked during an earthquake. Damage was assessed inside and out, with specialists examining each side of the famous obelisk. Architectural engineers from Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc. (WJE) delivered a detailed and illustrated report, Washington Monument Post-Earthquake Assessment(PDF), on December 22, 2011. Major repairs are planned to reinforce the cracks with steel plates, replace and shore up loose pieces of marble, and re-seal joints.

More Photos:
Washington Monument Illumination: Shining a Light on Architecture:
Learn more from About.com about the beauty of scaffolding and the challenges and lessons in lighting tall structures.

The Washington Monument in the News:

The Earthquake-Damaged Washington Monument Looks Really Snazzy at Night Nowby Mark Byrnes, Atlantic Cities, July 9, 2013
Washington Monument glows again amid restoration, USA Today, July 9, 2013, Copyright 2013, The Associated Press
Washington Monument Earthquake Updates from the National Park Service
Obelisk's Scaffold Is First of Its Kind, by Gabriel Escobar, Washington Post, December 30, 1998
Architect Michael Graves discusses scaffolding in A Monumental Task, PBS Newshour, March 2, 1999