The President's Dining Room is located in the northwest corner of the second floor of the White House

White House

The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...

. It was created in 1961 during the administration of John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

 to provide a dining room in the First Family's residence. The room had previously been used as a bedroom and sitting room. It is located directly above the Family Dining Room

Family Dining Room

The Family Dining Room is located on the State Floor of the White House, the official residence of the president of the United States. The room is used for smaller, more private meals than those served in the State Dining Room. Today the president uses the Family Dining Room less for family and...

 on the State Floor and looks out upon the North Lawn

North Lawn (White House)

The North Lawn at the White House in Washington, DC, is bordered on the north by Pennsylvania Avenue with a wide view of the mansion, and is screened by dense plantings on the east from East Executive Drive and the Treasury Building, and on the west from West Executive Drive and the Old Executive...

. The Dining Room is adjacent to a small kitchen, and serviceable by a dumbwaiter

Dumbwaiter (elevator)

Dumbwaiters are small freight elevators intended to carry objects rather than people. Dumbwaiters found within modern structures, including both commercial and private buildings, are often connected between two floors...

 connecting it to the main kitchen on the ground floor.

From 1929 to 1948, this room was known as the Lincoln Bedroom, before that it was known as the Prince of Wales Room.

Decoration

When first created, the room was decorated with painted walls and Louis XVI furniture belonging to the Kennedys. Henry Du Pont and Sister Parish

Sister Parish

Sister Parish was an American interior decorator and socialite. She was the first interior designer brought in to decorate the Kennedy White House, a position that was soon usurped by French interior designer Stéphane Boudin...

 recommended the room be furnished in American Federal style antiques. Beginning with the Kennedys, a collection of antiques have been acquired for the room including a Sheraton pedestal table that was made in Massachusetts between 1810 and 1815, a set of shield-back side chairs made circa 1890, and a carved wood mantel made in Philadelphia circa 1815. The room is used for small dinners and luncheons, and because of the limited size of these events some of the older White House china

White House china

The White House china is the various patterns of china used for serving and eating food in the White House, home of the President of the United States. Different china services have been ordered and used by different presidential administrations. The White House collection of china is housed in...

 existing in small numbers can be used. Portions of the older state china services are displayed in the china cabinet in the President's Dining Room and in the China Room. Elaborate curtains, of two shades of blue and based on Federal-era models, were designed by Stephane Boudin, under the direction of Jacqueline Kennedy. During the Kennedy restoration a plaster mantel produced circa 1815 in Philadelphia by Robert Wedford was installed on the east wall.

The south wall of the room is apsial

Apse

In architecture, the apse is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome...

 where the primary door, entering from the Center Hall, is located. The apsial wall in the President's Dining Room, and a near identical one across the hall in the president's bedroom were built during the Truman reconstruction. Though not original to James Hoban's original plan, they take inspiration from studies Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

 had made by Benjamin Henry Latrobe for altering several rooms in the White House. When the room was created as the President's Dining Room in 1961 the walls were covered in an early nineteenth century woodblock-printed scenic wallpaper, manufactured in France by Zuber et Cie, depicting views of North America. It is similar to the wallpaper installed in the Diplomatic Reception Room but instead of early citizens, European tourists, and Native Americans, it depicts imagined battles of the American Revolution.

During the Ford administration, First Lady Betty Ford

Betty Ford

Elizabeth Ann Bloomer Warren Ford , better known as Betty Ford, was First Lady of the United States from 1974 to 1977 during the presidency of her husband Gerald Ford...

 had the wallpaper removed and the walls painted a soft yellow. Rosalynn Carter

Rosalynn Carter

Eleanor Rosalynn Carter is the wife of the former President of the United States Jimmy Carter and in that capacity served as the First Lady of the United States from 1977 to 1981. As First Lady and after, she has been a leading advocate for numerous causes, perhaps most prominently for mental...

 had the scenic wallpaper reinstalled. In 1996, during the Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

 administration, the room was redecorated. The woodblock wallpaper was carefully covered with fabric covered wooden baffles and the walls were then hung with a chartreuse

Chartreuse (color)

Chartreuse is a color halfway between yellow and green that was named because of its resemblance to the green color of one of the French liqueurs called green chartreuse, introduced in 1764...

 Italian watered silk moiré fabric. During the second term of George W. Bush

George W. Bush

George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

, the walls were recovered in an off white color of silk lampas

Lampas

Lampas is a type of luxury fabric with a background weft typically in taffeta with supplementary wefts laid on top and forming a design, sometimes also with a "brocading weft". Lampas is typically woven in silk, and often has gold and silver thread enrichment.-History:Lampas weaves were developed...

 selected by interior decorator Ken Blasingame.

Prince of Wales Room

Before the room was a Dining Room, it was a bedroom suite. Edward, Prince of Wales

Edward VII of the United Kingdom

Edward VII was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910...

 stayed in the suite during his 1860 visit, and for years afterwards the room was known as the Prince of Wales Room. From 1929 to 1948, the room contained Lincoln's bed, Lincoln family photographs, and was known as the Lincoln Bedroom.

Other uses

• On April 16, 1865, Dr. Janvier Woodward and Dr. Edward Curtis autopsied
  Autopsy
  An autopsy—also known as a post-mortem examination, necropsy , autopsia cadaverum, or obduction—is a highly specialized surgical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a corpse to determine the cause and manner of death and to evaluate any disease or injury that may be present...
  
  , and Dr. Charles D. Brown embalmed
  Embalming
  Embalming, in most modern cultures, is the art and science of temporarily preserving human remains to forestall decomposition and to make them suitable for public display at a funeral. The three goals of embalming are thus sanitization, presentation and preservation of a corpse to achieve this...
  
  , Abraham Lincoln
  Abraham Lincoln
  Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
  
   in this room.
• From 1897 to 1901, it was the McKinley
  William McKinley
  William McKinley, Jr. was the 25th President of the United States . He is best known for winning fiercely fought elections, while supporting the gold standard and high tariffs; he succeeded in forging a Republican coalition that for the most part dominated national politics until the 1930s...
  
  's master bedroom.
• From 1901 to 1906, it was Alice Roosevelt
  Alice Roosevelt Longworth
  Alice Lee Roosevelt Longworth was the oldest child of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States. She was the only child of Roosevelt and his first wife, Alice Hathaway Lee....
  
  's bedroom.
• From 1909 to 1913, it was Helen Herron Taft
  Helen Taft Manning
  Helen Herron Taft Manning , was the second child and only daughter of President of the United States William Howard Taft and his wife Helen Herron....
  
  's bedroom.
• Between 1945 and 1953, it was Margaret Truman
  Margaret Truman
  Mary Margaret Truman Daniel , also known as Margaret Truman or Margaret Daniel, was an American singer who later became a successful writer. The only child of US President Harry S...
  
  's sitting room.