It’s called “Extreme Makeover 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue” because there will be only be a window of six hours to move one family out of the 132 room-White House by 12pm on Friday January 20th ( Presidential Inauguration day) and another one in by 6pm.
It’s a fraught process at the best of times but when relations between the incoming residents and the outgoing aren’t what they could be, the tension is heightened. “It will be organized chaos” the chief White House usher, Stephen Rochon, told CNN. “We will have one truck facing the the South Lawn that belongs to the outgoing President and the first family facing south and the incoming truck facing north towards the White House.
Over 100 staffers will be careering about barking instructions and supervising the move. It’s not clear if the rumoured Obama/Trump joke will actually happen: this refers to Barack Obama leaving a copy of his “Kenyan passport” in the Oval Office so it’s the first thing Donald Trump see when he arrives but a bit of humour may help to defuse the tension.
Thankfully, both the Obama and the Trump families will be away from the residence for most of the day of January 20th - first at the Presidential swearing-in and later at the Inauguration Ball.
No matter how many months of committee style planning goes into the move, there’s always some last minute hitch. When the Obamas moved in eight years ago there was a last minute scramble in a Washington DC shopping mall to find the new President’s preferred style of shower head - a “rain shower head” which, it says here, “makes you feel you are standing in the rain in the shower, with the flow of natural water falling gracefully onto your face”.
Personal decor choice can only be rolled out from January 21st onwards. The first floor of the White House (the working rooms) cannot be touched unless by written approval by the stern and inflexible Committee for the Preservation of the White House.
However the second and third floors (the private living quarters) are up for grabs and it is expected that Trump will impose his trademark opulent style on them - a style which appears to be a gaudy mix of the Palace of Versailles and Liberace on a sugar-rush.
Obama had just his shower rain head, Bill Clinton had a hot tub installed (asking for trouble) and Richard Nixon had a single-lane bowling alley put in but interior decor experts are already giddy with the thoughts of a Trump White House makeover.
Sandra Nunnerley, of the New York design firm of the same name, forensically looked at the decor already in place his Trump Tower and Mar-a-Lago residences, and confidently predicts the new White House to be full of “sumptuous Louis XIV appointments, framed by marble and gold leaf with glittering chandeliers added throughout”.
Cheryl Eisen, the CEO of the Interior Marketing Group, which has sold Trump properties, told Market Watch magazine that “Trump tends toward castle-like, Baroque-style finishes; we imagine him to bring in flourishes of gold and brass hues, black onyx and green marble.” She adds that “gilded, mahogany furniture and ornate patterns” will feature and that “oversize mirrors and chandeliers wouldn’t be surprising.”
Trumpifying the White House - and those antique Persian silk rugs aren’t picked up at Wal-Mart - could come at a cost of $10 million dollars. Trump will have to pay for his decor changes out of his own pocket as the official White House decorating budget doesn’t seem to stretch far beyond a new kettle and toaster.
Apparently there are White House accountants who are still traumatised by how much Nancy Reagan spent on fine China (which was never used).
While the Obama family will be remembered for their enthusiastic use of the White House’s basketball court and Michelle’s organic vegetable garden, a Trump White House will be more “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” in tone.
But lest the new President get too trigger happy with dipping everything in gold and putting chandeliers even inside the wardrobes, there is an instant Memento Mori on his very first day in the White House.
Trump’s first job in the White House, as tradition dictates, will be to arrange his own funeral.
