The White House Lays a Golden Egg
There's also a set of five brightly colored eggs, including one in 'Biden Blue' and featuring the first pets, in this year's Easter Egg collection.
A staggering 33,000 people visited the White House’s South Lawn last year the day after Easter to “roll” around with President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden.
The annual Easter Egg Roll was also the first in three years due to the pandemic. This year’s event is set for Monday, April 10.
For over a century starting in 1878, the Easter Egg Roll involved actual hard-boiled eggs dyed in various colors for the occasion, which added an odorous element to the affair and also the promise of a messy clean-up afterward.
The solution was non-perishable eggs. First introduced 40 years ago, wooden eggs are now made for use in place of real ones, both at the event and also as official takeaways and keepsakes.
Designed to reflect the special theme of each year’s roll and inscribed with the signatures of the current president and first lady, the Official White House Easter Eggs are produced and sold exclusively by The White House Historical Association, the same nonprofit entity behind the Official White House Christmas Ornament. (The Association itself is a product of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, established as a privately funded nonprofit to assist in preservation, collection, and education efforts of the federal building and its interior designs and decor.)
This year offers a Commemorative Gold Easter Egg ($24.95), bearing the imprint of a festive bunny, and an Easter Egg Set ($34.95) of five eggs, four of which are colored in pigments chosen by First Lady Biden — pink, orange, aqua blue, and green — imprinted with an image of the North Portico of the White House strewn with decorated eggs, and stamped with the Bidens’ signatures.
The fifth wooden oval is a royal-colored “Biden Blue” egg featuring the whimsical imprint of the Easter Bunny with the Bidens’ two First Pets, pup Commander and cat Willow, whose paw prints are featured on the back.
In addition to being sold on-site at next month’s White House Egg Roll, the Easter Eggs are currently available at the Association’s stores, including the White House History Shop (1610 H St. NW) and Mayflower Hotel Pop-Up (1127 Connecticut Ave. NW), and online at www.shop.whitehousehistory.org.
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