Given its illustrious neighbors, the Embassy Row Hotel in Washington, D.C., a part of Destination Hotels, should emanate an air of snootiness and privilege. After all, many of the magnificent embassies surrounding the hotel at Dupont Circle were once the mansions of wealthy socialites. Evalyn Walsh McLean, American mining heiress and last private owner of the 45-carat Hope diamond, gave lavish parties in her 60-room home directly across the street.
The mansion is now the Indonesian embassy and is just as expensively decorated as when Evalyn lived there. And right next door is the home where Alice Roosevelt Longworth, eldest daughter of President Theodore Roosevelt, lived and partied with abandon. Now it houses the Washington Legal Foundation.
Regardless of its neighbors past and present, though, the Embassy Row Hotel—elegant as it looks, and surrounded as it is by the ghosts of rich old ladies—has decided to take a completely different tack and, especially with its rooftop pool and bar, has encouraged a youthful vibe to take over the neighborhood with casual events and activities happening up on the 10th floor roof every day. Friday night is Silent Disco Night, with headsets given out as guests arrive. If they want to dance, they can put the head set on and listen to three different tracks, while others without head sets can chat in peace and quiet while watching in the same space.
On Saturday and Sunday mornings the hotel hosts Sunrise Yoga, free to guests and for a small fee to outsiders. Monday and Tuesday are Splash Cycle days, with the trendy new exercise class—yes, a spin class in the heated pool (which, by the way, is the only rooftop hotel pool in Old Guard Dupont Circle), Wednesday is Support a Cause day with one dollar donated from all food and beverage sales to favorite nonprofits. Thursday on the roof brings the International Summer Concert series to the hotel, which underwent a $15 million renovation in 2015 and brought bright artsy colors to the rooftop and the 231 guestrooms.
While the pretty little guestrooms do not have mini-bars, the boutique hotel encourages guests to go to the first floor Station Kitchen & Cocktails cocktail bar and coffee shop for those amenities, and while there remains the usual self-serve coffee available in every room, you must go to the coffee shop for their special knock-your-socks-off nitrogen-infused joe, which should come with a warning label: "Delicious, but only for the young; if you're over 30 and want to try a cup, have a heart monitor nearby!"
