Construction crews began moving a historic, 100-year-old building from one part of Landon School’s Bethesda, Maryland, campus to another.
“I consider this a once-in-a-lifetime feature of work,” project manager Eddie Rupp said.
The Andrews House at Landon school has served many purposes over the past century – home for the original landowners 100 years ago, then dorms, classrooms, faculty housing and administrative offices.
The 9,000-square-foot, 1,100-ton building began the journey to its new location Thursday.
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“And it’s a beautiful building, too, so from a historic perspective, from a space perspective and from a campus beauty perspective, we wanted to preserve it, it just was in the wrong place,” said Jim Neill, head of school.
Relocating the Andrews House is just one part of the extensive campus master plan project, making room for a new upper school, Neill said.
A team of expert engineers spent months planning and preparing the building for the big move, including capping off all the utilities and securing the stonework to preserve its historic look.
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“The ultimate travesty would be is if the house fell off the wheels and simply crumbled before our eyes, so everything we do before moving the house is to avoid that disaster,” Rupp said.
Moving the Andrews House is a multimillion-dollar endeavor, administrators said, but the meaning it holds for alumni and the campus community is priceless.
“Landon is a school with a rich legacy; it’s built on legacy,” Neill said.
“A building like this is a way of bringing the past into the future and tying them together,” he said.
The Andrews House set to be in place and ready for occupation by spring.
