The White House Experience Mobile App
The “White House Experience” mobile app brings First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s vision of an accessible White House to the modern age. For the first time ever, iOS and Android users can virtually tour the White House, the surrounding President’s Neighborhood, and even take a tour through time and learn how White House customs have evolved. In addition to educational tours, the app includes interactive experiences allowing for further engagement with history. With the Presidential Lookalike feature, users of the app can take a selfie and learn about the president or first lady they most resemble. The app’s newest feature, Fly Like Ike, celebrates President Eisenhower’s legacy of flying helicopters by giving users a chance to pilot the presidential helicopter around Washington, D.C.
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Leveraging content within the Digital Library, WHHA and Amazon Web Services worked with a partner company, Cuseum, to create and launch the first virtual mobile experience of the White House, including a virtual tour, a tour of the neighborhood, and a companion tour.
White House Historical Association -
The virtual tour in the app takes users through the entire White House and its history, highlighting the fine arts collection and showing app users all the famous rooms inside the Executive Mansion.
White House Historical Association -
Visitors on an in-person tour of the White House can use the mobile app to help them prepare for their visit and provide more information as they tour the Executive Mansion.
White House Historical Association -
The Presidential Look-Alike feature uses Amazon Rekogition technology to match user's selfies with the presidential and first lady portraits in the White House Collection to determine which president or first lady they most closely resemble.
White House Historical Association -
With “Fly Like Ike,” users can pilot the presidential helicopter around a virtual Washington D.C. and learn about historic sites, thanks to Amazon Sumerian technology.
White House Historical Association
Leveraging the content of the Digital Library, the White House Historical Association, together with Amazon Web Services and Cuseum, launched the first mobile experience of the White House in 2018. Download it today on your mobile device and don't miss our latest content:
At launch, the “White House Experience” app offered three separate tour experiences with information on the furnishings and decorative arts within the historic rooms of the White House and significant points of interest in the surrounding neighborhood.
The Virtual White House is a virtual tour of the White House that includes the East Wing, Family Theater, Library, Vermeil Room, China Room, Diplomatic Reception Room, Map Room, State Floor and the famous rooms of the West Wing including the Oval Office, Cabinet Room and Press Room. The tour also includes several rooms on the upper floors of the residence including the Lincoln Bedroom, the Queen’s Bedroom, the President’s Dining Room and the Treaty Room. The virtual tour can be experienced from anywhere.
The White House Neighborhood Walking Tour provides turn-by-turn navigation of the President’s Neighborhood for visitors in Washington, D.C. This tour includes stops at historic landmarks and buildings in the area such as Decatur House, Lafayette Square, St. John’s Church, Treasury Building, North Lawn, Blair House, Eisenhower Executive Office Building, South Lawn and Ellipse, and the White House Visitor Center. The app also features information on points of interest at each of the stops.
For visitors on an in-person tour of the White House, the app offers a Companion Tour that provides a room-by-room guide of the White House. This tour also includes information on where visitors should meet to begin the tour and items that are permitted and prohibited during their White House visit.
While virtual tours of the White House remain a signature component of the “White House Experience” app, additional tours have been added on a variety of topics including seasonal offerings about the holiday decorations and unique traditions such as the White House Easter Egg Roll. Other topics include the history of presidential transportation and changes to the White House fence. Future tours will continue to share the robust history of the White House and its habitants.
In addition to tours, the app’s Presidential Lookalike feature allows users to take a selfie and find out which president or first lady they most resemble. The result is based on a comparison to portraits of the presidents and first ladies in the White House Collection. The feature is powered by Amazon Rekognition, a deep learning-based image and video analysis tool.
The app’s newest feature, Fly Like Ike, allows users to explore a three-dimensional model of Washington, D. C. from the unique perspective of the presidential helicopter. By navigating the helicopter over designated buildings, parklands, and monuments, users hear information about the city’s iconic landmarks. At the end of the interactive tour, users can test their piloting skills by landing the helicopter on the South Lawn of the White House. This feature of the app is powered by Amazon Sumerian, a virtual reality platform. Please note this feature requires Wi-Fi or a data plan, and is compatible with iPhone 7 and up and devices running Android version 7.0 and up.
The app is part of an ongoing agreement with Amazon Web Services to assist the Association in promoting its educational mission through the use of cutting-edge digital technology. The app is run on the digital platform Cuseum with support from Amazon Web Services.
The White House Historical Association thanks the White House, National Park Service and the United States Secret Service for their support in launching the White House Experience app.
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With Support from Amazon Web Services