Just outside Washington, D.C., a nine-floor tower guards a George Washington secret

It’s part museum, part temple, all Washington

Just across the Potomac from Washington, D.C., a 333-foot neoclassical tower rises above the Alexandria skyline and stops people mid-drive.

You might assume it’s a government building or a monument you’ve passed a dozen times without stopping. It’s neither.

The George Washington Masonic National Memorial is the only museum in the country built around Washington’s life as a Freemason, and what’s inside nine floors will take you most of the day to see.

The ancient wonder that inspired this tower

The architects didn’t pull this design out of thin air.

When the New York firm Helmle & Corbett won the commission in the early 20th century, Harvey Wiley Corbett looked to the ancient Lighthouse of Alexandria in Egypt, one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, and built something that fuses classical Greek and Roman forms with early skyscraper bones.

Ground was broken in 1922. President Herbert Hoover attended the dedication in 1932, timed to the 200th anniversary of Washington’s birth. The full interior took until 1970 to finish, all paid for without debt.

The portico tells you what Washington thought of Masonry

Before you even get inside, the building gives you something to read.

Stone tablets on either side of the massive front portico carry passages from Washington’s own letters about Freemasonry.

The tower above you rises in three tiers, Doric at the base, Ionic in the middle, Corinthian at the top, each tier more ornate than the one below.

A pyramid and a light-symbolizing finial cap the whole thing.

Turn around from the front steps and you’ll see King Street running straight toward the Potomac River below.

The Olmsted firm shaped these 36 acres

The grounds didn’t happen by accident either. The Olmsted Brothers firm, the same practice behind Central Park in New York and the U.S. Capitol grounds, designed the 36 acres surrounding the memorial.

Landscape architect Carl Rust Parker, a Freemason himself and one of the most respected in his field at the time, led the work.

In 1999, workers installed a 4,000-square-foot Square and Compasses emblem on the front terraces, large enough to see from the air. The green space is open to walk, and the Potomac Valley views stretch out wide.

Eight 40-foot columns anchor Memorial Hall

Step inside and the scale resets your expectations. Memorial Hall’s eight green granite columns stand 40 feet high and run more than four feet wide.

Tennessee marble covers the floor. Two large murals by artist Allyn Cox fill the north and south walls.

The north wall shows General Washington and his officers at a St. John’s Day observance at Christ Church in Philadelphia on Dec. 28, 1778.

The south wall shows President Washington at the Masonic cornerstone ceremony for the U.S. Capitol on Sept. 18, 1793.

Washington in Masonic regalia, cast in bronze

At the far end of Memorial Hall, a 17-foot bronze statue of Washington stands in a curved niche, dressed in full Masonic regalia. You don’t see Washington portrayed this way often.

Sculptor Bryant Baker created it, and President Harry Truman, a Freemason and former Grand Master of Missouri, dedicated it in 1950.

It’s one of the first things you see when you walk in, and it sets the tone for everything above it on floors two through nine.

The portrait that shows Washington’s actual face

One floor up, a replica of the original Alexandria-Washington Lodge No. 22 meeting room holds artifacts that date to 1802. The original altar, the Master’s chair, and the officers’ station furniture are all here.

A portrait by William Joseph Williams hangs on the wall, widely considered one of the most accurate likenesses of Washington ever painted, smallpox scars visible, jaw set exactly as people who knew him described.

Also in the room: the silver trowel Washington actually used at the 1793 Capitol cornerstone ceremony.

Washington family Bible and Mount Vernon artifacts

The fourth floor’s George Washington Museum breaks Washington’s life into chapters: Virginia planter, military officer, first president, national icon.

Many of the artifacts here came directly from Washington’s own descendants at Mount Vernon. The 1792 Washington Family Bible is in the collection.

A mezzanine level digs into how the memorial itself was built and what Masonic architectural symbolism means, with objects that once hung on the walls at Mount Vernon.

Fourteen Freemason presidents line the theater walls

The memorial’s semicircular theater seats nearly 400 and runs on sixteen gold-veined Missouri marble columns in the Doric order.

Along the mezzanine, 14 bronze plaques mark every president of the United States who was a Freemason. The Washington family coat of arms sits above the stage.

A portrait of Washington by Alexandria artist Christopher Erney hangs at the center, commissioned for the centennial of the Memorial Association’s founding.

The theater hosts lectures and performances through the year.

Allyn Cox’s stained glass glows on the eighth floor

On the eighth floor, the Knight Templar Chapel stops most visitors in their tracks.

The space was dedicated in 1957 and holds four stained glass windows designed by Allyn Cox, the same artist who painted the Memorial Hall murals and later completed the frieze in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.

Color moves through the windows differently depending on the time of day. It’s one of those rooms where you stand still for a few minutes without meaning to.

Pick out the Washington Monument from 400 feet up

The ninth-floor observation deck sits roughly 400 feet above sea level and gives you a full 360-degree outdoor view. To the north, the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial line up along the National Mall.

To the east, the Potomac stretches toward the Chesapeake Bay, with planes arcing in and out of Reagan National Airport. Below you to the south, Old Town Alexandria’s historic streets fan out toward the waterfront.

Virginia’s landscape rolls west. Inside the ninth floor, photographs from the 1920s and 1930s show the whole building going up.

From Ben Franklin to the Shriners, nine floors of Masonic history

The third floor’s Family of Freemasonry exhibit maps the organizations that grew out of the Masonic tradition: the Shriners, the Order of the Eastern Star, the Scottish Rite, the York Rite, and youth orders.

On the first floor, the Form and Function of American Freemasonry exhibit profiles four notable Freemason leaders, Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Andrew Jackson, and Harry Truman, and traces the craft’s history through the colonial era.

Grand Masonic Hall itself, with eight polished New Hampshire granite columns and six etched glass panels, closes out the ground floor with a bronze bust of Washington and a mural of Mount Vernon wrapping the walls.

Visit the George Washington Masonic National Memorial in Alexandria

You’ll find the memorial at 101 Callahan Drive in Alexandria, Virginia.

It’s open Monday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and closed Tuesdays, Wednesdays and federal holidays.

Guided tours run five times daily at 9:30 a.m., 11 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3:30 p.m., and each tour runs about an hour. Admission is $20 per person; children 12 and under get in free with an adult.

Advance reservations are required, so buy tickets through the official website before you go.

Free parking is on site, and the King Street-Old Town Metro station on the Blue and Yellow lines puts you a free trolley ride away.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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