Library of Congress

The White House and the Capitol may be more iconic, but for our money (well, none, seeing as admission is free), the LOC, the world’s largest library, is the most impressive structure in DC.

It’s just the sheer scope of the thing: approximately 120 million items, including 22 million books, plus manuscripts, maps, photographs, films and prints shelved along over 500 miles of closed library stacks in the three main library buildings, Adams Building (cnr 2nd St & Independence Ave SE), Jefferson Building (cnr 1st & E Capitol Sts SE) and Madison Building (1st St SE btwn Independence Ave & C St SE). You don’t get to see most of this material, unfortunately, but checking out where it’s housed is still pretty damn impressive.

The centerpiece of the LOC tourist experience is the historic 1897 Jefferson Building, where you can wander around the spectacular Great Hall, ornate with stained glass and marble. The LOC’s purpose is simple – to collect all the knowledge in the world. The artwork of the Great Hall reflects the beauty that emerges from such amassed wisdom, and the arduous task of cataloguing it. Goddesses and cherubs represent different fields of knowledge, scraps of the human experience that are realized in the form of some of the world’s rarest books. Multimedia kiosks provide the minutest details of the library’s awe-inspiring collection.

Anyone over the age of 18 carrying photo ID can use the library, and more than a million people do so each year. The Main Reading Room, which resembles nothing less than an ant colony harvesting books, is in the Jefferson Building, but it’s just one of 22 reading rooms. The Library of Congress is a research library, meaning you can’t check the books out, but you can read them inside its confines. The Madison Building also hosts concerts, and screens classic films in the Mary Pickford Theater.