A New Commitment to Classicism in Washington

Civic buildings should convey a dignified message, not an irreverent and off-putting one, as if the architecture were honoring the public services taking place.

A worker walks on the roof of the Carnegie Library as it is converted to an Apple Store in Washington on April 30, 2019. Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

Commentary

When I lived and worked in Atlanta, for two years I regularly went downtown to study in the Atlanta–Fulton Central Library. It had in its collections some materials I needed for a book I was writing about the 1906 Atlanta riots. I had to go there to see them, but if the materials had not been housed inside, I would have never gone back after my first visit. The architecture of the building is precisely the opposite of the kinds of spaces and materials that encourage and reinforce curiosity about the past.