Stewards of the iconic buildings and grounds of Capitol Hill since 1793.

Featured

View of the Capitol Christmas Tree in 2013 at night next to the Capitol Building.
The regular practice of displaying a Christmas tree on the Capitol Grounds is...

Featured

A crowd of people visiting the Capitol during visitor hours
Please note: Many of these Capitol Hill buildings are working office buildings...

Featured

East Front of the U.S. Capitol Building
AOC’s annual Performance and Accountability Report provides the results of the...

Featured

Band Photo
Evenings at the Conservatory are magical! Join us Tuesdays and Thursdays...

Benjamin Henry Latrobe

Painted Portrait of Benjamin Henry Latrobe
Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Second Architect of the Capitol
Born: 
May 1, 1764, near Leeds, England
Died: 
September 3, 1820, New Orleans, Louisiana
Hired by President Thomas Jefferson, March 6, 1803; construction halted by July 1, 1811; Hired by President James Madison, April 6, 1815; Resigned November 20, 1817

Benjamin Henry Latrobe was hired by President Jefferson in 1803 to fill the position of "Surveyor of Public Buildings," with the principal responsibility of constructing the Capitol’s south wing. He was also responsible for work at the President’s House and the Navy Yard. After the south wing was completed in 1807 Latrobe began reconstructing the interior of the north wing. Construction funds were withheld after 1810, and Latrobe’s public employment came to an end. After the two wings were damaged by fires set by British troops in 1814, Latrobe was rehired to oversee restoration.

During this period he worked only on the Capitol and had no responsibilities for other government buildings. Latrobe’s employment contract was signed with the commissioners on April 18, 1815, and he resigned on November 20, 1817. He left at the Capitol some of the greatest interiors in the history of neoclassicism in America, including the Hall of the House (now National Statuary Hall), the Old Senate Chamber, and the Old Supreme Court Chamber. He is honored as the second Architect of the Capitol.

Born in 1764 near Leeds, England, Latrobe studied architecture under Samuel Pepys Cockerell and engineering under John Smeaton. He emigrated in 1796 and began his American career in Virginia before settling in Philadelphia. There he designed the Bank of Pennsylvania, the first neoclassical building in the United States to display a Grecian order. He is also known for designing St. John's Church in Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. In 1820 he died in New Orleans, where he had gone to build the city’s municipal water system.