National Building Museum

Founded by Congress in 1980, the National Building Museum occupies Washington’s former Pension Bureau building, an 1887 design by Montgomery C. Meigs created to house a greatly expanded post-Civil War federal office serving veterans, widows, and orphans. Rejecting Washington’s usual Greco-Roman style, Meigs drew on Italian Renaissance models and produced an early large-scale American Renaissance Revival landmark. Its vast Great Hall, monumental columns, and Caspar Buberl frieze of Civil War military life are defining features. Once mocked and later threatened with demolition, the building was preserved, recognized as a historic landmark, and adapted into a museum and active public venue.

Washington, District of Columbia · United States