Mr & Mrs Smith

Mr Smith and I stepped into the gilded lobby of the St Regis and started to giggle. Here we were, just a few blocks from our offices, checking into a hotel for the weekend. It felt a touch illicit, just the ingredient required to carry off a romantic getaway so close to home. The hotel certainly provided the romantic backdrop: a lobby perfumed by lush flower arrangements – elaborate hydrangea-and-rose set pieces, carefully tucked into glass vases – and sparkling with massive crystal chandeliers. We marveled that we could be transported so far from workaday Washington so fast.

That is, really, the unique beauty of the St Regis: it is within spitting distance of the White House, so close that during the inaugural festivities it lies inside the security zone, yet it has none of the stuffy bleakness of so many Washington hotels. Newly renovated, it feels more like its sister property in New York. The bar, once a cigar-smoke-filled den tailor-made for lobbyists and backroom deals, is now a sleek, dark watering hole with silver accents, a drink menu that includes a $500-a-glass scotch, and a clientele mercifully short on congressional staffers. There are no large tour buses from the heartland headed here.

Having arrived straight from work after a long week, we decided to have dinner at Adour, the hotel restaurant, straightaway, rather than go to our room. It meant that we were an unfashionable 45 minutes early, but I was interested in testing the flexibility of the place—it looked somewhat foreboding from the outside. The hostess wasn’t bothered in the least. She seated us right away, guiding us to a large, U-shaped booth with seats covered in a velvety cloth. We were quickly treated to an amuse bouche of creamy foie gras and risotto soup – unexpected, strange, and delicious. Over the next two hours we moved through course after artful course: artisanal pasta with butternut squash and ricotta; hangar steak with barbecue sauce; farm-raised Berkshire pork loin and glazed belly with Yukon potatoes. The dessert, chocolate and earl grey mousse, with grapefruit cream and sorbet, came with a tray of strawberry and chocolate macaroons that were so delectable, we asked for a half-dozen more. 

When we finally rolled up to our room, we found a more old-fashioned space full of plush, cozy furniture, but leavened with modern touches such as a television screen built into the bathroom mirror, Mr Smith’s favorite element. Breakfast the following morning, delivered in less than 20 minutes, was as extravagant as dinner: fruit salad, fresh-squeezed juices, eggs, bacon, hand-rolled croissants, and coffee. And our choice was far from the most elaborate one. The ‘Astor’ breakfast, named for the wealthy patron, John Jacob Astor IV, who opened the original St Regis in New York in 1904, comes with a two-person presentation of caviar, fruit and vegetable juices, croissants, prosciutto and melon, a chef’s omelette with Maine lobster and applewood-smoked bacon.

The 10-block radius around the hotel is packed with landmark Washington: Blair House, where foreign dignitaries stay, the US Treasury Department building, and Teaism, a casual spot where White House staffers eat lunch. Though the area around the White House has gotten increasingly locked-down to traffic by the Secret Service since 9/11, it is still easily accessible on foot – and you can entertain yourselves by spotting the clusters of agents lingering on every block. On Saturday morning we wandered the few blocks to Lafayette Park and over coffee, admired 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, with the reporter in me thinking back to the days when this seven-acre greensward was a popular rendezvous for journalists and their White House sources. If the president or vice president is in town and you hang out here long enough, you’ll see a motorcade whizzing up Connecticut Avenue.

As a White House correspondent, I am a frequent visitor to this little patch of land: my regular route takes me from the Washington Post building on 15th Street past the St Regis to the northwest visitors’ gate of the White House. Public tours of the building are now difficult to come by, requiring help from a member of Congress or, for foreign visitors, your embassy, and from firsthand experience, I can say it isn’t nearly as dazzling as the one of the Capitol Building.

The real fun of the area is the people-watching. Eat at the Bombay Club, also known as the New York Times’ cafeteria for its proximity to the paper’s DC bureau, and you will see famous political figures lunching with famous columnists. (You can get some of the same action at the Oval Room restaurant and at the Hay Adams Hotel.) If you want to combine church and state, drop in for Sunday services at St John’s Episcopal, where every president so far has attended at least once during his tenure. 

The landscape to the far (or south) side of the White House, on and around the National Mall, is where the real tourism action is. Here, the free-entry Smithsonian Museums compete with block after block of government buildings, leading all the way up to Congress. The Capitol Building is an excellent jumping-off point for touring Capitol Hill, an old neighborhood full of little restaurants and on Sundays, the Eastern Market. During our weekend, we detoured from the beaten path here so I could show Mr Smith one of my favorite off-beat haunts, the Congressional Cemetery, which has gravestones going back to the War of 1812. OK, not your usual excursion on a romantic break. 

Back at the St Regis bar on Saturday night, we reminisced about the times we had spent there in the past. I’ve been part of the weekly breakfast roundtable that meets in the basement to grill famous political figures about their agendas, and have been to the star-studded party that precedes the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Over hamburgers and crab cakes, we toyed with the idea of booking a room here anytime we have a party downtown from now on. That gave way to the grander fantasy of ditching our mortgage altogether and just moving in, which told us that our weekend escape had been a success. What better getaway is there than one that you wish would last forever?