Hunca Munca

It was often said that Charlottesville seemed straight from a storybook. For two years, I lived next to a beautiful place with red brick and white columns. It was not really used though apart from hosting suppers that had been prepared elsewhere. The Rotunda very much reminded me of Lucinda's dollhouse from The Tale of Two Bad Mice for that reason- a look completed by the bisque-like statue of Thomas Jefferson occupying its entrance hall.

The University of Virginia's centerpiece had been touted as one of the few UNESCO world heritage sites still serving their original functions but it was doing so less and less. Mr. Jefferson, father of the university and credited as the Rotunda's architect, intended for the half-scale Pantheon to be multipurpose with a library, classrooms, and laboratories yet those roles had long moved elsewhere. The needs of any educational institution change over time but it was a fire that relegated this historic landmark to ceremonial use, not modernization.

That being said, to adapt Beatrix Potter's tale here... One day Mr. Jefferson's statue had gone out to the special collections library. There was no one left in the Rotunda, and it was very quiet. Presently there was a little scuffling, scratching noise in Pavilion II near the southeast corner... UVa's Office of the Architect had set up headquarters there for an ambitious improvement plan while he was away.

Although it looked perfect, the Rotunda was in disrepair. The aforementioned fire completely gutted Mr. Jefferson's Rotunda in 1895 and subsequent attempts at reviving this iconic structure had been done on the cheap. Its dome leaked and weathered Corinthian capitals were dropping chunks of marble. The Office of the Architect said their restoration would celebrate the University's bicentennial but it was going to do more than simply that. For this improvement to happen the Rotunda had to be completely gutted once again.

Restoration can be a destructive process in and of itself. Everything had to be taken apart and stripped down before anything else could be done. Yet, this deconstruction provided a unique opportunity for architectural historians and historic preservationists. Caches of burnt timbers, broken glass, and crinkled shingles were discovered from past iterations- as well as one of the oldest chemistry hearths in America.

I myself had a unique opportunity: marble fragments were given to me by construction workers replacing the column bases. In retrospect, I cannot help but think of these pieces as being like Lucinda's plaster ham smashed to bits by Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca. Sad, unfortunate, and disappointing. The kernel-sized fragments would have been thrown away had I not felt intrinsic value and asked for them. Shadow boxes were bought and I glued the pieces onto hand-drawn copies of the Rotunda's original plan as mementos for friends.

When work was completed, Mr. Jefferson's statue returned to find his library better than when he left it. In fact, the Rotunda was better than ever. At great risk, and with immense effort, an underground kitchen had been added for cooks to prepare meals there rather than elsewhere as before. New capitals were imported from Carrara, Italy, and students found classrooms in previously off-limit spaces. Not only had it been physically restored, the Rotunda's purpose was revitalized. If my time in Charlottesville really was out of a storybook, I certainly hope that this is happily ever after.