The public has never paid much attention to architecture, alas. Today, less than ever, which may help explain why so many mainstream media outlets no longer have full-time architecture critics. There is one exception to this architectural brownout: the extraordinary coverage devoted to the White House ballroom and the proposed triumphal arch near Arlington National Cemetery. There is plenty of evidence that people who give architecture little thought nevertheless have a soft spot for buildings such as the Lincoln Memorial and Mount Vernon. The debate over President Trump’s architectural agenda has changed that, because what was once a stylistic question has become a political one. The association will be cemented when the White House ballroom is complete. It may well have the same devastating effect on classicism that the J. Edgar Hoover Building had on Brutalism. I suspect it will take a generation or more for proponents of classical architecture to overcome what may prove to be an indelible stain.
