How Donald Trump is using architecture to reshape Washington DC
US president Donald Trump and his administration are using architecture to reshape the American capital at a pace unmatched in recent memory. We explore how the president is utilising design to cement his legacy.
Trump's impact on the capital is undeniable and relatively unprecedented.
From the small-scale interventions, such as the gilt detailing of the Oval Office, to the extremely impactful demolition of the East Wing at the White House and plans for a monumental arch that will dwarf the Arc de Triomphe, he is transforming the city.
On the urban scale, these changes have been underwritten by staffing of personnel in advisory boards that manage construction in the city, giving Trump broad power to enact change in the capital.
They are underpinned by a series of style mandates released by Trump, designating traditional and classical styles as preferred ones, not just in the capital, but nationally.
"Part of a very long tradition"
"Both the design and the process of implementation are under threat," MIT associate dean of urban design and planning Lawrence Vale told Dezeen.
"It's fundamentally about situating the American landscape in earlier traditions that asserted power and authority – less about style and more about the capacity for a regime to control as much of the visible landscape as possible," he continued.
"It's part of a very long tradition of global leaders who have used their position to alter their capital city."
He noted Mao Zedong's renovation of Tiananmen Square, India's prime minister Narendra Modi's Vista Project in India and Napoleon III's renovation of Paris as precedents.
Vale, whose 1992 book Architecture, Power, and National Identity is a point of reference for analysing power as it is exercised through design, believes that Trump's executive decision-making around design is meant to cement his policy.
"If you have an idea that is written down as a policy or articulated in a speech, it's much more powerful if you can enact it in the built environment," said Vale.
After a year in office, how has Trump reshaped the capital to match his agenda?
Construction and demolition
The White House ballroom is the most high-profile of Trump's plans for the capital. Through it, Trump is literally reshaping the seat of power.
But it is by no means the only project underway.
Last year, Trump announced that the administration sought to construct a monumental arch – jokingly called the Arc de Trump by commentators – on an empty roundabout across the river from the Lincoln Memorial.
Built to mark the 250th anniversary of the United States, the president has said he wants it to be 250 feet tall in height, nearly 100 feet taller than the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, commissioned by Napoleon Bonaparte in the early 19th century.
Trump has also revived his first-term plans for a National Garden of American Heroes "to reflect the awesome splendor of our country's timeless exceptionalism". Reportedly, the president is eyeing a site near the National Mall for the project.
And the building frenzy doesn't stop at the monumental, Trump has also proposed projects that seem strikingly personal, such as a golf course in the capital city and a temporary UFC arena to be built to celebrate the nation's quarter millennium.
Back at the White House, Trump has also made further interventions around the White House, such as the paving of the Rose Garden, transforming it into a massive patio – carried out relatively quietly, as if testing the water for the extremely invasive East Wing demolition.
No part of the People's House seems immune, with suggestions that Trump may renovate the West Wing as well.
As federal officials remove plaques illustrating the history of slavery and violence towards Native Americans, the renovation mania expands out from the White House. It includes the proposed painting of neo-classical Eisenhower Executive Office Building and calls for the abandonment of the city's brutalist structures, such as the Robert C Weaver building.
Vale believes that another project that has gone relatively unnoticed is among the most important: the redesign of Lafayette Square, a National Historic Landmark adjacent to the White House.
The area is currently fenced off for planned repairs on the fountains, but according to the Washington Post, Trump has suggested removing the pavers for fear of their use in future protests. The square featured murals painted during the Black Lives Matter movement and was the site of the tear-gassing of protestors during a protest during Trump's first term.
Vale said that these proposals, which countermand the plans of the local government, demonstrate conflict between the vision of the federal government and the expression of the local government.
This site not only represents the historic impulse to modulate public space to shape behavior, but also the relationship between the federal and the local more generally.
"We get to 2025, and there's pressure from the president and the Congress… threatening to withhold the allocation of funds to the District," said Vale.
"So there you're getting a set of design changes that affect the way one approaches the White House, and also the accommodation of gatherings," he continued.
"The battle between local government and federal oversight is spatialized in terms of urban design politics."
Renovations and Naming
Government buildings are not the only targets of the design arsenal wielded by the Trump administration.
Trump has exerted influence over Washington Dulles International Airport, suggesting the design is "terrible".
He asked the Department of Transportation (DOT) to gather proposals for a revamp. Many architects answered the call, including Zaha Hadid Architects, which went as far as plastering Trump's name on the airport renderings.
Trump allies have commented on private projects on government land leases, such as the upcoming Washington Commanders stadium. National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) chair Will Scharf suggested that it should be "classical" and Trump himself floated the idea of the stadium bearing his name.
With a long record of slapping his name on modernist skyscrapers as a business leader, Trump, has apparently continued this practice in buildings with historic or civic significance.
The John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, named after the former president, was changed to the Donald J Trump and the John F Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts before being closed in February 2026 for a two-year renovation.
The New York Times called this flurry of naming a "spree of self-aggrandizement".
In 1867, two years after the assassination of president Abraham Lincoln, the US Congress created a commission to construct a grand monument to the president in the heart of Washington DC.
After decades, multiple resolutions, counter-resolutions, and design submissions, the project was launched in 1913, with the memorial finally dedicated in 1922, nearly 60 years after Lincoln's death.
Construction of the Washington Monument featured a similar delay and was dedicated in 1885, even though the first American president, George Washington, to whom it is dedicated, died in 1799.
Vale believes that this naming spree is meant to contextualise power and for buildings to reflect the values of a subset of the American population supportive of the general political atmosphere.
"Cementing personal achievements and consolidating a legacy, especially in capital cities, may feature rhetoric all about the national and the patriotic, but things they build cater to an interest in a smaller subsection of favored people," said Vale.
"I just don't see this kind of glorification of the current leader as something we've ever had in the United States."
Shifting policy and institutions
Two institutions generally have advisory power over what gets built, and how, in Washington DC – The National Planning Commission (NCPC) and the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA).
The NCPC provides oversight for federal building projects within the National Capital Region, which encompasses much of the part of DC that holds the monuments and administrative buildings. Meanwhile the CFA advises the national government on "matters of design and aesthetics" and recently approved the designs for the ballroom expansion on the White House.
Both bodies are staffed at the president's discretion, and Trump has taken full advantage of this authority.
The CFA, in particular, shows design institutions as a site of political manoeuvring, with former president Biden calling for the resignation of Trump-appointed members in 2021 and Trump restaffing the council entirely with seven of his own appointees in January 2026.
James McCrery, the first architect of the two who have worked on Trump's ballroom expansion for the White House, now serves as vice chair for the commission.
The NCPC's role has been highlighted of late, with its hearings on the designs for the White House expansion. A Trump-appointed secretary, William Scharf, who currently heads the NCPC, provided cover for the demolition of the White House, citing the NCPC's lack of oversight powers in demolition actions.
Though the committee includes appointees from DC's local government and from Congress, Scharf and two other Trump aides on the committee have signalled approval for the White House plans.
Former commission members told the Washington Post that the closeness to the president and lack of specialisation of the NCPC appointees is a departure from norms.
Part of the problem is that design in the capital has largely relied on norms instead of explicit legislation over the past 100 years – especially in relation to the White House and its renovations –according to historian Neil Flanagan.
"Up to now, federal architecture has reflected a balance between executive-branch discretion and the influence of trusted experts," wrote Flanagan in the Atlantic.
"Trump has shown how fragile that approach was all along – and how both professionals and ordinary Americans took it for granted."
Dezeen In Depth
If you enjoy reading Dezeen's interviews, opinions and features, subscribe to Dezeen In Depth. Sent on the last Friday of each month, this newsletter provides a single place to read about the design and architecture stories behind the headlines.
The post How Donald Trump is using architecture to reshape Washington DC appeared first on Dezeen.