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Warder Mansion
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| Location: | 2633 16th Street Northwest, NW, Washington, District of Columbia |
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| Area: | 0.3 acres (0.12 ha) |
| Built: | 1885-88, rebuilt 1923-25 |
| Architect: | H. H. Richardson |
| Governing body: | Private |
| NRHP Reference#: | [1] |
Warder Mansion (formerly known as Warder-Totten House) is a Washington, D.C. apartment complex at 2633 16th Street Northwest. Located about 1.5 miles north of the White House, it is the only surviving building in the city by architect H. H. Richardson.[2] An early example of preservation commitment, the building was saved from demolition in the 1920s by being disassembled and reassembled elsewhere. By the 1990s, the Warder-Totten House's prospects for survival looked bleak, but the building was saved a second time.
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Benjamin H. Warder was president of Warder, Bushnell & Glessner Company, a major manufacturer of farm machinery. In 1902, his was one of 5 companies merged to form International Harvester.[3]
In 1885, Warder hired Boston architect H. H. Richardson to design his house at 1515 K Streets NW. Richardson died in 1886, but his firm completed the house in 1888. Warder died in 1894, and his widow occupied the house until 1921.
In 1923, the Warder House was about to be demolished to erect an office building. Architect George Oakley Totten, Jr. bought the exterior stone (except the main doorway, which reportedly went to the Smithsonian) and much of the interior woodwork. He transported the building, piece by piece (reportedly in a Model T Ford), to its present Meridian Hill site, reassembled it over two years, and converted it into an apartmenthouse. The reconstructed building later housed the National Lutheran Council, and the Antioch College of Law.[4]
The site was listed on the D.C. Inventory in 1964, and on the National Register in 1972.
Antioch College left in 1986. The building was vacant for more than a dozen years, and was virtually reduced to a shell by fires and vandalism.[5] It was placed on the DC Preservation League's Most Endangered Places List in 1996, and remained on that list for several years.[6]
Renovated in 2001-02,[7] it now serves as the entrance to Warder Mansion, a complex of 38 one- and two-bedroom apartments carved out of the house and a 9-story addition.
Warder's daughter Alice (1877-1952) married diplomat John Work Garrett (1872-1942) at the house in December 1908, with then-First Lady Edith Roosevelt in attendance. Following Ambassador Garrett's inheritance of his family's mansion, "Evergreen," custom-made furnishings from the Warder House were moved to Baltimore.
The Garrett mansion is now Johns Hopkins University's Evergreen Museum & Library. Its Warder pieces include a set of Thomas Sheraton-inspired chairs from the DC house's diningroom,[8] an ornately inlaid center table from the DC house's drawingroom, and a handsome pair of possibly-architect-designed 'throne' chairs, carved with sunflowers, an ornate "W," and the year 1887 (the Warder House's year of completion).[9]