Our Capitol, now and way back then
The Legislative Building as it currently stands. (Photo courtesy of Katy Payne)
Washington's Capitol, known as the Legislative Building, is well known for its grandeur and magnificence. As you stand on one of the 42 steps (the significance being because Washington was the 42nd state) leading to one of the massive 2,000-pound bronze front doors and look up, it might astound you how much larger the building is in person than it seems in photographs. Rising to 287 feet, it is the fifth tallest masonry dome in the world, and the tallest in North America. The buildings on the Capitol Campus were designed in the early 1900s by Walter Wilder and Harry White, a pair of young, talented and inexperienced architects – the Olympia job was their first major commission. The impressive 54-acre landscape was a masterpiece of the Olmsted Brothers, landscape designers of various parks, universities and capitol grounds throughout the country. The Legislative Building was completed in 1928 after six years of construction and $7,385,768.21 spent. To reconstruct the same building today using the same materials, it would cost over $1 billion – 135 times more money than was spent before! Fun facts about the building: -It would take 136 Olympic-sized swimming pools or 28 average-sized water towers to fill the Legislative Building completely with water. -It would take just over 14 adult male giraffes, stacked on top of one another, to reach the top of the dome. -The Legislative Building weighs 188,500,000 pounds, which is 10 times as much as Seattle's Space Needle.
Legislative Building construction on September 3, 1924. (Photo courtesy of State Archives)
Legislative Building's progress two years later, in 1926. Photo courtesy of State Archives)
Dome construction in 1926. (Photo courtesy of State Archives)
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Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs
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