Yellow Oval Room - Furnishings

Furnishings

The earliest written description of the room dates to the John Adams administration, and describes the room as a ladies drawing room. The room was papered in yellow with gilded stars, and a suite of crimson furniture. This furniture, likely a mix of Louis XVI and English Hepplewhite styles was moved from the President's House in Philadelphia.

With the building of the West Wing in 1902, and moving of offices out of the residence, this oval room was again used as a parlor. Franklin Roosevelt used it as an office in the residence. Following the Truman reconstruction the room was once more used for state events and entertaining. During the Kennedy Administration the room was designated as a drawing room and received many of the furnishings now located there as well as its designation as the Yellow Oval Room. The American interior designer Sister Parish established the basic design of the room by painting the walls a soft yellow, joined by a pale yellow oval carpet topped by Oriental rugs. The French interior designer Stéphane Boudin built upon Parish's contributions, replacing the Truman era hotel style furniture with late 18th and early 19th century French antiques. The furnishings today are mostly in the Louis XVI style, assembled during the Kennedy restoration. Two short columns of green marble were designed by Stéphane Boudin to hold antique, electrified candelabras and Boudin also found the bronze dore and rock crystal 18th century chandelier in Paris for the room. A suite of American manufactured painted wood Neoclassical settee, six armchairs and four side chairs, were reupholstered in a wool and silk velvet faux tiger print during the administration of George W. Bush and moved to the adjoining Center Hall.

Lady Bird Johnson continued the Kennedy decor. Under the direction of Pat Nixon during the Nixon administration, other pieces of antique furniture were acquired for the state and family floors. The Yellow Oval Room was redesigned in a more academic style by the Nixons' new curator, Clement Conger, with architect and interior designer Edward Vason Jones. Vason Jones replaced Sister Parish's simple curtains that fit within the window frames with the current grander gold and coral stripe that cover the woodwork (see image above right) somewhat reducing the sense of height of the room. During the Carter Administration American Impressionist paintings, including Mary Cassatt, were acquired and hung in this room and the Center Hall.

Nancy Reagan, with her designer Ted Graber, brought back the two upholstered sofas used by Mrs. Kennedy in the room. Laura Bush, working with her family decorator Ken Blasingame, replaced these sofas with similar ones of a slightly larger scale; returned a number of bouillotte lamps to the room; and added an overmantel mirror. She also re-installed the chandelier from the Kennedy era, which Mrs. Nixon had replaced with an overscale, Empire chandelier, formerly in the Kennedy Blue Room.