



Monticello
Porticles Restoration
In continuing to provide assistance with the restoration efforts of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, the firm was commissioned to provide design services for reconstructing Jefferson’s porticles (open air louvered rooms) on the south terraces of Monticello. Jefferson’s original intent for these rooms was to filter the intense Virginia sunlight while allowing summer breezes to circulate and cool the rooms.
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Based on historical evidence found on the building itself, wood remnants found on site, photographs from the late nineteenth century and Jefferson’s sketches of his louvered rooms; the firm provided complete working drawings for their reconstruction. Working closely with on-site historians and archeologists, the challenge was to discover and apply Jefferson’s sketches to the physical evidence on the building and to carefully examine the historical photographs as these rooms had not existed for almost a century.

