It’s gone. Honestly, it’s still weird to drive past that massive plot in Woodley Park and realize the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel isn't hosting a massive political gala or a swarm of 5,000 tech enthusiasts anymore. For nearly a century, that sprawling complex was basically the heartbeat of DC’s convention scene. It wasn’t just a hotel; it was a city within a city.
If you ever stayed there, you know the vibe. It was huge. Confusing, too. You could get lost for twenty minutes just trying to find the right elevator bank to get from the historic Wardman Tower over to the mid-century exhibition halls. But that was part of the charm. It felt like history was baked into the wallpaper.
Why the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel finally closed its doors
People keep asking if it was just the pandemic. Not really. While the 2020 lockdowns were the final nail in the coffin, the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel had been struggling with deep financial debt for years. It was owned by Pacific Investment Management Co. (PIMCO), and by the time early 2021 rolled around, they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
The numbers were staggering. We're talking about a property with 1,152 rooms. Keeping the lights on in a place that big without a constant stream of massive conventions is a financial nightmare. When the "stay-at-home" orders hit, the math stopped working. Marriott International actually walked away from the management agreement, and by the summer of 2021, the whole thing was sold at auction for about $152 million to Carmel Partners.
A legacy that started with "Wardman’s Folly"
To understand why locals were so bummed about the closure, you have to go back to 1918. Harry Wardman was the developer. People called the project "Wardman’s Folly" because it was so far out from the center of DC at the time. They thought nobody would travel that far "uptown" to stay at a hotel.
They were wrong.
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It became the place to be. We’re talking about a hotel that hosted inaugural balls for presidents ranging from Herbert Hoover to Bill Clinton. It was the site where the first televised variety show, The Swift Show, was broadcast in 1948. Even the Beatles hung out there.
The Wardman Tower—the older, more regal part of the hotel—was home to some serious power players. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson lived there. So did Herbert Hoover and Dwight D. Eisenhower. If those walls could talk, they’d probably be under a non-disclosure agreement with the Department of Justice. It had this specific kind of DC "old guard" elegance that you just don't find in the glass-and-steel boxes they build today.
The weird, sprawling layout everyone loved to hate
If you were a regular at the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel, you had a love-hate relationship with the floor plan. It was a massive 16-acre campus.
One minute you’re walking through a high-ceilinged, 1920s lobby with crown molding, and the next, you’re in a 1970s-era concrete wing that feels like a different universe. It had 195,000 square feet of event space. That’s enough to fit nearly four football fields.
- The Exhibition Hall was a cavernous basement-level space where you’d find everything from comic book conventions to massive medical symposiums.
- The outdoor pool was a hidden gem, tucked away from the street noise of Connecticut Avenue.
- The escalators were legendary for always being packed with people wearing lanyards and clutching overpriced coffee.
It was one of the few places in the District that could handle a group of 3,000 people without breaking a sweat. Now that it’s gone, that business has largely shifted to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center downtown, but the vibe is totally different. Woodley Park feels quieter now. A little too quiet, maybe.
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What is happening to the site now?
The wrecking balls didn't wait long. After Carmel Partners bought the site, the plan became clear: residential. They’ve been working on tearing down the non-historic parts of the hotel to make way for a massive multi-unit housing complex.
The good news? The historic Wardman Tower—that iconic brick building with the gorgeous balconies—is being preserved. It was already converted into luxury condos a few years back, so that piece of the skyline remains intact. But the main hotel "bridge" and the newer wings? They’re history.
Construction in DC is never fast. If you walk by today, you’ll see a lot of scaffolding and dust. The goal is to bring more permanent residents to Woodley Park, which the local restaurants desperately need since they lost the "convention lunch" crowd. Places like Open City and Lebanese Taverna used to be packed with hotel guests; now they’re pivoting to serve the neighborhood locals more exclusively.
Addressing the rumors: Was it haunted?
You can’t have a century-old hotel in DC without ghost stories. Employees used to swear they saw "The Lady in Gray" or heard phantom footsteps in the service tunnels. Given the sheer amount of political stress and high-stakes deals that happened there over ten decades, it wouldn't be surprising if some of that energy stuck around.
But honestly, the "haunting" most people remember was just the sheer complexity of the building. Getting lost in the back hallways of the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel at 1:00 AM after a wedding reception was a rite of passage.
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Lessons from the Wardman Park's downfall
The closure taught the hospitality industry a tough lesson about "too big to fail."
- Diversification is everything. Hotels that rely 90% on group bookings and conventions are incredibly vulnerable to economic shifts.
- Infrastructure costs are killers. The deferred maintenance on a 16-acre historic property is a black hole for capital.
- Location sentimentality doesn't pay the bills. As much as DC residents loved the history, the price of modernizing those rooms to compete with the newer Wharf or Navy Yard hotels was just too high.
The Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel represented an era of grand, mid-century travel that is slowly being phased out for boutique experiences or hyper-efficient modern hubs.
How to explore the legacy today
If you’re feeling nostalgic or just want to see what’s left, you can still visit the area. Take the Red Line to the Woodley Park-Zoo/Adams Morgan station.
Walk south on Connecticut Avenue. You can still see the Wardman Tower standing tall. While you can't check into a room anymore, you can walk through the neighborhood and see the scale of the demolition. It gives you a real sense of how much space that hotel occupied.
For those looking for a similar "historic DC" hotel experience, your best bets now are the Omni Shoreham right next door—which is still very much open—or the Mayflower Hotel downtown. They have that same "power player" history without the looming threat of a wrecking ball.
The era of the mega-hotel in Woodley Park has ended, but the impact it had on DC’s development can’t be erased. It turned a quiet suburb into a world-class destination. That’s a pretty solid legacy for "Wardman’s Folly."
Practical Steps for Former Guests and Fans:
- Photo Archives: If you want to see the interior before it was gutted, the Library of Congress and the DC Public Library (People’s Archive) have extensive digital collections of the Wardman Park’s evolution.
- Wardman Tower: If you have several million dollars lying around, you can actually live in the historic wing by purchasing one of the remaining condos.
- Nearby Alternatives: If you need to stay in Woodley Park, book the Omni Shoreham. It shares much of the same history and is literally a three-minute walk from the old Wardman site.
- Support Local: Visit the shops on 24th Street and Connecticut Ave. They’ve had a rough few years since the hotel closed, and they’re the last standing link to that era of the neighborhood.