The warmth of the Green Room
is the perfect ambiance for teas and receptions held here during the
course of the year.
The artwork in the Green Room is some of the
finest in the White House and includes David Martin's renowned
portrait of Benjamin Franklin, Henry Ossawa Tanner's Sand Dunes at
Sunset, Atlantic City and Georgia O'Keeffe's Bear Lake, New
Mexico. It is the mantel of the Green Room, however, that
traditionally catches our eye during the holidays. This year, we
bring back fanciful mantelpiece created for our 1996 holiday theme,
The Nutcracker, by ornament artist Christopher Radko. On the
tables in the Green Room stand clusters of nutcracker ornaments
created by wood craftsmen and ballet companies in 1996.
By tradition, the Blue Room is the place of honor for the
official White House Christmas tree. This year an eighteen-and-one-
half-foot Douglas fir was presented to The President and Mrs. Clinton
by Paul and Sharon Shealer, and their children Briana and Paul, of
Evergreen Acres Tree Farm in Auburn, Pennsylvania. The Shealers won
the honor after being name the National 2000 Grand Champion Grower
by the National Christmas Tree Association. To decorate this regal
tree, we have chosen a sampling from all our past ornaments. The
velvet tree skirt you see has adorned the base of the Blue Room tree
every year since 1993, when it was designed by individuals from each
of the fifty states, territories and the District of Columbia in
celebration of our first holiday season at the White House. The Blue
Room pier tables also showcase art from the White House Collection
of American Crafts.
One of our favorite holiday pastimes is sneaking
down to the State Floor late at night, after all our daily visitors
have left, to marvel at the glistening balls created by glass
artists, the hand-stitched hats and mittens created by The Knitting
Guild of America, the beautiful ornaments hand-painted by the Society
of Decorative Painters, and the fantastic needlepoint designs stitched
by the American Needlepoint Guild and The Embroiderers' Guild of
America. Socks was especially happy one year when his likeness,
rendered in needlepoint, crowned the Blue Room tree. In 1999, premier
craftsmen from across the country decorated this tree with
reproductions of historical objects such as furniture, tin, silver,
pottery, oil paintings and paper cuttings, to name but a few.
As you enter the Red Room, you
can't help being tempted, as our dog Buddy was, by the edible
mantelpiece created by New York cake artist Colette Peters. Ms.
Peters has created a confectionery masterpiece depicting the scene
she designed for our 1998 theme, Winter Wonderland. Each of
the tables in the Red Room is decorated with charming snowmen created
by fabric artists in 1998. The traditional cranberry tree sits atop
the most important piece of American Empire furniture in the White
House collection, the marble-top center table made in New York around
1810 by Charles-Honoré Lannuier.
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