Mass. State House gold dome is in dire need of costly repairs

It’s an architectural jewel, a gleaming symbol of government. It’s also discolored and deteriorating, with parts temporarily bound together by chicken wire. The Massachusetts State House’s iconic

It’s an architectural jewel, a gleaming symbol of government. It’s also discolored and deteriorating, with parts temporarily bound together by chicken wire.

The Massachusetts State House’s iconic golden dome and cupola is in need of repair. A long, brown scar rings a part of the shining golden dome, giving it, from one angle, the appearance of a bruised banana. An 8-foot column broke away from the 126-year-old cupola earlier this year, prompting structural engineers to decide to band it together temporarily with orange bracing and the aforementioned chicken wire.

The problems are clear, but how the state intends to address them are not. Officials have not committed to a timeframe for repairing the landmark or indicated how extensive any project could be.

It’s been a quarter-century since the state last applied a new layer of 23-karat gold leaf to the 225-year-old dome, which still shines in the sunlight but has also taken on blemishes.

Tammy Kraus, superintendent of the Bureau of the State House, said she first noticed seven years ago the long, brown patch that’s visible from nearby Bowdoin Street, but what caused it, or whether the whole dome needs to be regilded, has not been determined.

The need for repairs became clearer when a piece of the cupola broke away this year, sending the deteriorated column tumbling over the dome — scuffing it in one section — and onto the roof below, Kraus said.

Officials in the state’s Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance, which sits under Governor Maura Healey’s budget office, said it’s currently doing a “complete building assessment” of the State House, including the condition of the dome. It did not yet have a cost or timeline for the assessment itself or any proposed repairs.

“It’s the State House. We only have one,” Kraus said. “We need to take care of it.”

The 1997 regilding of the dome cost $300,000. Before then, it hadn’t been done since 1969, when it cost $36,000.

Such a project now would likely not be cheap. In 2016, New Hampshire committed $1 million to refurbishing its dome, including laying 5 pounds of new gold leaf. The last time Massachusetts’ regilded its dome, it required 13 pounds to cover the 9,100-square-foot structure, the Globe reported at the time.

“It needs to continue to be gilded. That should be something that’s automatic for whoever is in charge at the moment,” said Keith Morgan, a professor emeritus at Boston University and editor of “Buildings of Massachusetts: Metropolitan Boston.”

The state last refurbished the cupola in 2013 as part of $400,000 project that also added lightning rods to the building, including one in the golden pine cone perched atop the building.

During a tour Wednesday of the dome and roof, cracked and peeling paint marked the white underside of the dome. Peering down from the cupola, one could see sections of the gold leaf appeared to have a dark grayish film. On a cloudy day earlier in the week, streaks of dirt appeared to skirt the top of the dome’s surface.

The dome is more than a symbol of Massachusetts. When the State House was completed in 1798, it was one of the first domed governmental buildings in the United States, influencing what would become the “image of public and government architecture across the whole country,” Morgan said.

It also wasn’t always golden. Originally built using wood shingles, it quickly began leaking before the Legislature approved the purchase of copper from Paul Revere’s foundry, which was used to sheet the dome.

The dome was first gilded in 1874 — at a cost of $2,900 — and has remained that way except for during World War II, when it was temporarily painted a dark gray to make it a less obvious target for enemy ships or bombers, according to the state’s official history.

Should the state pursue repairs, it would be one of many projects in the works at the State House. Senate and state officials are already in the early stages of assessing the focus of a potential $5 million renovation of Senate President Karen E. Spilka’s office. Healey initially included the project in her recently released Capital Investment Plan with the $5 million price tag, though the state has yet to tap a designer, nor has it set a timeline for any work in Spilka’s office or nearby Room 333.

Spilka’s office also cautioned that the $5 million cost is an “estimated upper limit” for the work, which could address infrastructure needs, accessibility issues, or sprinklers. Costs of the assessment for the project, estimated to be around $100,000, will come out of the Senate’s own operating budget, said Gray Milkowski, a Spilka spokesperson.

Spilka’s aides did not directly address why the office needed renovations, instead saying any work will be guided by the assessment.

“If the review identifies infrastructure and safety deficits in the physical spaces used by Senate members and staff, those needs will be addressed,” Milkowski said.

The building’s General Hooker entrance reopened this year after undergoing a security facelift, while Ashburton Park and the Ashburton Park Entrance are expected to be closed until at least September as, they, too are renovated. The work in both areas is part of two major construction projects, collectively budgeted at $21.3 million, state officials said.

The State House has seen a slew of other major projects over the last decade. The Senate chamber was renovated in 2018, at a cost of $22.6 million, and the governor’s 19,000-square-foot executive suite underwent a $11.3 million makeover four years earlier. The building’s roof was replaced in 2013, at a cost of $20.5 million.

Matt Stout can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him @mattpstout.

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