Nottoway Plantation, also known as Nottoway Plantation House is located near White Castle, Louisiana, United States. The plantation house is a Greek Revival- and Italianate-styled mansion built by slaves and artisans for John Hampden Randolph in 1859, and is the largest extant antebellum plantation house in the South with 53,000 square feet (4,900 m2) of floor space.John Randolph commissioned renowned architect Henry Howard of New Orleans with the task of designing the grand mansion with the intention that no expense would be spared in the construction. Howard sited the three-story wooden frame house, which includes a one-story rusticated stucco-covered brick base on a concrete foundation, to face east towards the Mississippi River. The entrance facade is asymmetrically balanced, with a projecting bedroom wing to the left side and a large curved bay with galleries on the right. The main five-bay structure, with a central projecting portico, emphasizes height rather than width, with the main living areas on the second and third stories both being 15.5 feet (4.7 m) in height above the one-story basement, scored to appear as stone, and featuring an arched niche flanked with narrow fenestrations. The galleries are embellished with custom ornamental iron railings made in New Orleans and capped with molded wooden handrails. Double curved granite staircases, installed by skilled mason, Newton Richards, rise to the second story. These steps were built with the left side intended for ladies and the right for gentlemen. The boot scraper at the bottom can also identify the steps for the men. The separate staircases were so that the men would not see the women's ankles beneath their skirts as they climbed, which was considered a severe breach of social etiquette at the time. The close spacing and angularity of the gallery's 22 square columns and elongated capitals also emphasize the vertical qualities of the house. Above the capitals, small brackets branch out to carry a tall entablature decorated with modillions, supporting a projecting cornice that nearly covers the hipped roof that is pierced with six chimneys. In the rear of the house is a two-story garçonnière wing where the Randolph sons resided.Construction of Nottoway was completed in 1859 at an estimated cost of $80,000 (~$1.97 million in 2021). Randolph destroyed the architect's plans after completion to prevent any duplicate homes from being built.Nottoway has over an acre of floor space spread out over three floors and a total of 64 rooms with 165 doors and 200 windows, most of which can double as doors. The house enjoyed 19th-century novelties such as a bathroom on each floor with flushing toilets and hot and cold running water, gas lighting throughout the house, and a complex servant call-bell system. The principal rooms of the house are located on the second floor. The entrance hall runs the length of the house and is 12 feet wide and 40 feet long. Large Baccarat crystal and brass chandeliers hang from the 15.5 feet (4.7 m) high ceilings and the doors with hand-painted German Dresden porcelain doorknobs and matching keyhole covers, leading to the adjacent rooms are 11 feet (3.4 m) tall. Above the doors and along the ceilings are plaster frieze moldings, with modillions interspersed with paterae, made from mud, clay, horse hair, and Spanish moss. To the right of the entrance hall is the most unusual, and John Randolph's favorite room in the house is the White Ballroom. With Corinthian columns, hand-cast archways, and an L-shaped extension into a curved bay, Randolph had it painted entirely white, including the flooring, to show off the natural beauty of his seven daughters, six of whom would be married there. Featuring two fireplaces with hand-carved rococo white marble mantles, there is also an original mirror placed so that the women could see if their ankles or hoops were showing beneath their skirts. Over one of the fireplaces, there is a painting of Mary Henshaw (no relation to the family), whose eyes are said to follow the viewer around the room. Flanking the entrance hall to the left are a gentleman's study, a stair hall, and the formal dining room. The study and the dining room feature black Italian hand-carved marble mantles on their coal-burning fireplaces, and the rooms are filled with period antique furniture. The dining room plasterwork showcases pink camellias, Emily Randolph's favorite flower, and is the only plasterwork in the house to have color.
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