Boston Athenæum
- Architect
- Edward Clarke Cabot
- Year
- 1807
- Style
- Renaissance Revival
- City
- Boston, MA
The Boston Athenæum, founded in 1807 by the Anthology Club of Boston, is one of the oldest independent libraries in the United States and still operates as a membership library where patrons pay a yearly subscription. Its Beacon Hill building at 10½ Beacon Street was designed by Edward Clarke Cabot in the Renaissance Revival style and now carries a National Historic Landmark designation.
the building
Washington's own library. Among the Athenæum's holdings is the largest surviving portion of George Washington's personal library from Mount Vernon, along with Jean-Antoine Houdon busts of Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Lafayette that once belonged to Thomas Jefferson.
Rare books and rarer art. The collection runs to more than 100,000 rare volumes and 100,000 works of art, including a first edition of John James Audubon's The Birds of America, a 1799 set of Goya's Los caprichos, and portraits by Gilbert Stuart, Chester Harding, and John Singer Sargent, alongside one of the world's most important primary-source collections on the Civil War.
the style
The building's Renaissance Revival design by Edward Clarke Cabot gives the membership library the dignified, palazzo-like presence fitting an institution that houses George Washington's own books alongside Houdon's sculpture and Sargent's portraiture.
More on Renaissance Revivalsignificance
The Boston Athenæum holds both National Historic Landmark and National Register of Historic Places designations and remains one of the oldest independent libraries in the country.
nearby
- Boston Transit Commission Building
- Chester Harding House
- Massachusetts State House
- Tremont House
- Suffolk County Courthouse
- King's Chapel