St. John's, Lafayette Square

St. John's Church on Lafayette Square sits behind a broad yellow portico, its pale stucco walls standing in sharp contrast to the red brick of the nearby houses. Benjamin Latrobe designed it in eighteen sixteen, shortly after he finished his work on the White House nearby. Parishioners paid for their own pews in the early days, and every president since James Madison has attended a service here. During the height of the nineteenth century, it became the regular place of worship for national leadership.