Our story
A quiet house with a long memory.
History
A summer house built like a monument.
In 1911, Washington lumber baron Robert F. Lytle commissioned architect David L. Williams to build his summer residence on a quiet corner of Irvington — and spared nothing. Raised by the McHolland Brothers for a reported $46,000, a fortune in its day, the house rose with six two-story Corinthian columns under a red tile roof. The neighbors took one look and started calling it Portland's White House. The name stuck.
The craft
A lumberman's fortune, told in wood.
Lytle made his money in timber, and the house is his masterwork — quarter-sawn oak floors inlaid with mahogany, unpainted mahogany casework, box-beam ceilings, gold-leaf moldings, hand-painted murals, and stained glass by Portland's famed Povey Brothers studio. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, the house has kept nearly all of it. When you stay here, you sleep inside a piece of the city's history.
1911
Commissioned by Robert F. Lytle
$46,000
The reported cost to build
6
Two-story Corinthian columns
1983
Listed on the National Register
The B&B years
A house the city fell in love with.
Long before this newest chapter, the house welcomed travelers as one of the country's most celebrated bed & breakfasts — TripAdvisor's #1 B&B in Portland and a Hall of Fame inductee, a BedandBreakfast.com Best U.S. B&B, named among Sunset's top ten. Then came 2021, and the doors closed. The caretakers who had poured their lives into the house were heartbroken — and a quiet corner of Irvington went quieter than anyone wanted.
Be restored. Help restore.
The quiet here has a purpose.
Reopening these doors gave the house a second calling. Portland's White House is now the flagship of SproutWorks, and revenue from every stay helps fund its nonprofit mission — walking alongside people coming out of recovery as they step into stability, belonging, and real, lasting work. The house that broke hearts when it closed now helps mend lives while it's open. You come here to be restored. Your stay helps restore someone else.
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