Revered Tennessee marble quarried for U.S. Capitol project
Eleven-ton blocks are being quarried from outcroppings in the southern Appalachian hills, formed from the beds of ancient shallow seas 300 million years ago.
Sliced, shaped and polished, the marble is then sent 500 miles north to Washington.
“Oh, it is a once-in-a-lifetime order,” said Monica Gawet, owner of Tennessee Marble Co., about 25 miles south of Knoxville.
The architects of the three-level visitor center taking shape beneath the east front of the Capitol wanted to match the stone with what was used in the House and Senate wings in the 1850s. That meant sandstone from Pennsylvania, granite from Minnesota, pink and cedar marble from Tennessee.
“There really aren’t a lot of options for pink marble in this country, and we do have a ‘Buy America’ clause,” said Tom Fontana, spokesman for the Capitol Visitor Center project.
Nick Smith, an aide to Senate majority Bill Frist of Tennessee, said he’d “love to be able to have Frist take credit” for the state’s contribution to the $400 million project, but “they tell me that using the Tennessee marble is consistent with material used originally.”
More than 35 tractor-trailer loads of marble from Gawet’s company and from nearby Tennessee Valley Marble Co. are being finished for the visitors center, which is expected to open next year.
In keeping with tradition, the stone will adorn large indoor spaces — a great hall at the entrance, dining areas and bathrooms.
Gawet’s company is supplying about 25,000 square feet of pink tiles, some up to 5 feet long, for a featured pattern in white marble floors. Tennessee Valley Marble is producing more than 1 million pounds of cedar-colored stone fashioned into thick baseboards, wainscoting, railings and stair treads.
The price of the Tennessee marble represents about a quarter of the $35 million interior stone and installation contract, according to contractor Boatman & Magnani of Capitol Heights, Md.
“It is big. It is going to be something when it is done,” Boatman & Magnani manager Don Holland said. “They are sparing no expense, as they should. They are building a big monumental space.”
The 5-acre project covers a larger footprint than the Capitol itself. It will provide a new below-ground entrance affording tighter security, two orientation theaters, dining for 600, gift shops and other amenities for the thousands of daily visitors to the legislative branch.
Using Tennessee marble not only is in keeping with the rest of the Capitol Building, but with the city’s other major edifices.
“It is all over Washington,” Tennessee Valley Marble President Tom White said. “Tennessee marble is at the National Archives. It is at the National Gallery of Art, the Lincoln Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the Smithsonian, the National Cathedral. This is a stone that has been there for some time.”
“All of the great public buildings had Tennessee marble here in D.C.,” Holland agreed.
Gawet said the stone’s initial appeal was durability. “It was determined to be an outstanding stone for high traffic interior uses. That’s how its reputation came about,” she said.
There was another reason, though.
“I am less than objective,” White said, “but it also is a beautiful stone.”
Tennessee marble can be found only along a narrow 120-mile geologic path known as the Holston Formation. The seams rise and fall and frequently fracture, and only about 20 percent of the stone pulled from a quarry ends up a finished product after processing, lending to higher prices.
Marble quarrying began in eastern Tennessee in the 1830s and peaked a century ago. As architectural tastes changed in the 1960s to glass-and-steel designs, demand evaporated and quarries closed.
But with the restoration of older buildings — and the renewed interest of a few architects such as I.M. Pei — has come a mini revival.
Gawet and White, who have the only two Tennessee marble companies now operating, say they have plenty of work and Tennessee marble for now. How much longer the stone will be available in large quantities, as urban sprawl encroaches on quarry sites, is unclear.
“Based on the extraction rate that we have now, my children might be operating this quarry,” Gawet said. “But that all depends on when you get into the new areas, how solid the stone is.”
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Tennessee Marble Co: http://www.tnmarble.com
Tennessee Valley Marble Co.: http://www.tennesseevalleymarble.com
U.S. Capitol Visitors Center: http://www.aoc.gov/cvc