A boutique hotel has opened in Washington, D.C., combining the restoration of a long-vacant historic building with a newly constructed property as the city works to revitalize its downtown commercial district.
The Arlo-brand hotel welcomed guests this week at 333 G St. NW. The complex is made up of a 12-story property with a penthouse and the refurbishment of the existing Harrison Apartments that had been unused for roughly 20 years. It is considered the city’s oldest surviving conventional apartment building.
The total project contains roughly 230,000 square feet of total construction, Anne Kummer, a senior project manager at Architecture Inc., the firm that helped design the project, told CoStar News. The total space includes the 36,000 square feet in the existing building.
“The location is huge,” Gene Weissman, a partner with the architecture firm, said in an interview with CoStar News.
The new hotel is coming on line at a time when the city is aiming to better draw crowds into the surrounding commercial downtown area with a modernized sports complex. The city is home to a number of federal government offices where staff are either fully or partially remote. The lack of worker foot traffic has hurt dry cleaners, lunch spots and other businesses.
This month, the D.C. Council held a public hearing to discuss the economic revitalization of the downtown area, including the planned renovation of Capital One. The Arlo is a five-minute walk from the arena that plays home to the NBA's Washington Wizards and NHL's Washington Capitals.
Downtown recovery underway
A modernized arena will be a boon for tourism, hospitality and retail sectors, all vital components of the downtown economy, said Jack McDougle, president and CEO of the Greater Washington Board of Trade, in his testimony.
McDougle said the initiative is particularly important “as we strive to recover from the economic challenges of recent years.”
There are several hospitality projects in the pipeline for the District in 2025 and beyond, according to the city’s tourism agency website. Meanwhile, D.C. is one of the few hotel markets where the number of hotel rooms in the final planning stages closely matches those under construction, according to CoStar analytics.
“We look forward to welcoming travelers and locals alike,” Oleg Pavlov, CEO of the private equity group Quadrum Global, which owns the D.C. Arlo property as well as other Arlo hotels, said in a statement. The building is Arlo Hotels’ seventh location and its first in the nation’s capital.
With 445 guest rooms, the hotel features an indoor and outdoor rooftop lounge, a pool, a new Spanish restaurant named Arrels, a cafe and an interior courtyard. It also has 4,287 square feet of event space, including five private meeting rooms.
Building with history
Built in 1888 with a red brick Romanesque Revival facade, the Harrison Apartments joined the city's list of officially designated historic properties in the 1990s.
Quadrum Global purchased the property in 2019 after another redevelopment attempt did not move forward, according to a submission to D.C.'s Historic Preservation Review Board. The firm bought it from developer Renaissance Centro in a $26.1 million deal, according to CoStar research.
“Historic work is a challenge, especially for commercial developers," Weissman said. "It takes a little bit of an act of love to make these things viable projects."
The building was named after President-elect Benjamin Harrison, who won election to the nation’s highest office the year the building was constructed, the review board submission added. Harrison, the 23rd president, served from 1889-1893.
The property changed hands and operated under different names several times since the 19th century before it eventually fell into a derelict state and was vacated.