Washington (AFP) - Blair House, the historic Washington residence where select foreign visitors are sumptuously housed, and where one US president escaped an assassination attempt, is gearing up for a state visit by France's Emmanuel Macron.
The French president and his wife Brigitte Macron, who arrive Tuesday, will be following in the footsteps of Charles de Gaulle, Queen Elizabeth II and the emperor of Japan when they move into the venerable brick structure across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, in the heart of the federal capital.
Behind its rather austere three-story facade, Blair House actually comprises four contiguous buildings, forming a complex of 70,000 square feet (6,500 square meters) -- larger than the White House itself -- including 119 opulently decorated rooms dedicated to welcoming foreign leaders or providing a venue for high-stakes diplomatic talks.
In the back, a quiet garden with a fountain, park benches and ivy-covered walls allows visitors a chance to enjoy fresh air far from the tourists who swarm Pennsylvania Avenue.
The president's guest house, as it is often described, has been the scene of marathon negotiating sessions over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and yearly meetings of G7 finance ministers.
It also played host to a colorful visit in the 1990s by heavy-drinking Russian president Boris Yeltsin who, according to Bill Clinton, was seen one day in 1995 hailing a taxi out front in his underwear and, a day later, mistaken for a drunken intruder wandering in the building's basement.
And in 1998, British Prime Minister Tony Blair played on the similarity in names, quipping that he felt "kind of at home" when he stayed at Blair House.
Guns and cigar smoke
In addition to welcoming foreign dignitaries, it is in Blair House where a US president-elect traditionally spends the last few days before his inauguration.
That gave rise to a minor kerfuffle in 2009.Democratic president-elect Barack Obama arrived from Chicago with his family and hoped to move into Blair House early while preparing for the mammoth celebration around his historic January 20 inauguration.
But the Republican administration of George W. Bush said he could not move in before the 15th, offering the excuse that a former Australian prime minister, in town to receive an award, was still there -- an excuse that met with skepticism from some commentators.
Despite a lack of extensive security surrounding Blair House at the time, President Harry Truman and his family spent years there (1948-1952) while the White House was undergoing a major renovation.
That minimal protective layer made it possible on November 1, 1950 for two armed Puerto Rican independence activists to break in in a vain attempt to assassinate Truman.One assailant and a policeman were killed.
Inadequate security was also blamed when, in September 2000, an intruder managed to reach the room where the Indian prime minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, was staying.Vajpayee was not present at the time.
Built in 1824, Blair House was soon purchased by Francis Preston Blair, editor in chief of the Washington Globe newspaper and a close advisor of President Andrew Jackson, who used the building as a venue for a sort of salon for the city's elite.
In 1942, the US government purchased Blair House at the urging of president Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose patience had been tried by White House visitor Winston Churchill, who would fill the mansion's hallways with acrid cigar smoke and once tried to rouse FDR at three in the morning for a chat.
