White House renovations A touch of Mar-a-Lago comes to Washington

"Sir, why are you up on the roof?" The question was shouted by a reporter on Tuesday as Donald Trump scaled new heights at the White House.

- David Smith

The US president explained that he was scoping out a new ballroom and boasted: "Just another way to spend my money for this country."

It emerged last week that Trump, who made his money in the New York construction industry, intends to build an enormous $200m (£150m) ballroom for hosting official receptions, one of the biggest projects at the White House in more than a century and the latest step in a radical architectural overhaul to make the 225-year-old executive mansion less redolent of stuffy Washington and more evocative of Mar-a-Lago, his gaudy palace in Palm Beach, Florida.

Trump has revamped the Oval Office by splashing the room in gold, from the stars surrounding the presidential seal on the ceiling to gold statues on the fireplace to the mantel itself. He crowded its walls with numerous portraits, while just outside the office is a framed photo of Trump's mugshot as featured on the cover of a New York tabloid newspaper.

Outside, the president has put up a pair of flagpoles that fly the stars and stripes and paved over a grassy patch of the Rose Garden.