The Facade of Privilege – The Former Rittenhouse Club, Rittenhouse Square, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

In 1878, the Social Art Club, founded in 1875 as a literary society, moved from 1525 Chestnut Street to 1811 Walnut Street, the first house built on Rittenhouse Square by James Harper in the 1840s (with the marble portico). To celebrate its move, the organization changed its name to the Rittenhouse Club. Founding member Frank Furness redesigned the building, covering the red brick facade with white marble. In 1890, the club purchased 1813 Walnut Street and connected the two buildings' interiors. By 1900, the Rittenhouse Club was one of the city’s most fashionable retreats for men, described by one guide as a "junior ultra swell club." The author Henry James, who praised it for its "large friendliness, ordered charm and perfect peace," used to sit at a window and view this Square with his worldly eye.

The club – long a bastion of white, male, Anglo-Saxon privilege, lost its clubhouse but continues to exist as an "inner club" of the Acorn Club, a women’s club – itself a bastion of white, female, Anglo-Saxon privilege. The building that formerly housed the club was recently demolished except for its facade, which now fronts a new high-rise condominium.