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Born in Pittsburgh in 1886, Duncan Phillips was the grandson of James Laughlin, a banker and co-founder of the Jones and Laughlin Steel Company. Duncan and his family moved to Washington, D.C. in 1896. In 1918, after the untimely deaths of his father and brother, Duncan Phillips and his mother decided to open two rooms in their 1897 Georgian Revival home as The Phillips Memorial Gallery. Duncan Phillips opened the Collection as a museum of modern art and its sources, believing strongly in the continuum of art and artists influencing their successors through the centuries. Today, The Phillips Collection continues to offer Washington residents and visitors an inviting place to enjoy and understand art. The Phillips Collection offers an active schedule of temporary exhibitions, lectures, concerts, gallery talks, classes, parent/child workshops, teacher training programs, film series, receptions, and other activities. The Phillips Collection is located in the Dupont Circle area, one-half block off of Massachusetts Avenue on 21st Street, between Q and R Streets.
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Because the
city was built from scratch, Washington's
regular town plan is easy to grasp. Centered
on Capitol Hill and its governmental
monoliths, the District is divided into four
quadrants - northeast, northwest, southeast
and southwest. Dozens of broad avenues , all
named after states, run diagonally across a
standard grid of streets , meeting up at
monumental traffic circles like Dupont
Circle. North-south streets are numbered,
east-west ones are lettered. There's no J
Street, an intentional slight to early
Supreme Court Justice John Jay, or X, Y or Z
Street. I Street is often written Eye
Street. Be sure to note the relevant
two-letter code in any address (NW, NE, SW,
SE), which shows its quadrant; 1600
Pennsylvania Ave NW is a long way from 1600
Pennsylvania Ave SE.
Once in the
city, stop at the
DC Chamber of Commerce Visitor Center ,
Ronald Reagan Building, 1300 Pennsylvania
Ave NW (Mon-Sat 8am-6pm, Sun noon-5pm; tel
202/328-4748), which can help with maps,
tours, bookings and citywide information.
Look for visitor information desks at the
airports and Union Station.
The White House Visitor Information Center
, 1450 Pennsylvania Ave NW (daily
7.30am-4pm; tel 202/208-1631), supplies free
maps and handy guides to museums and
attractions; the most useful is the free
Washington DC Visitors Guide .
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