Social Scene

Georgetowner • May 3, 2012

Arlington Food Assistance Center’s 2012 Benefit Reception focused on raising support for their Annual Fund while celebrating the successful conclusion of AFAC’s Permanent Home Campaign. The goal for this year’s gala was $135,000, and the funds raised at this event will allow AFAC to continue meeting the growing demand for food assistance in Arlington. Photos by Aaro Keipi, (http://www.aarograph.com)[www.aarography.com] [gallery ids="100608,100609,100610,100611,100612" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Chef Viktor Merényi of the Embassy of Hungary took top honors at the fourth annual Embassy Chef Challenge held March 8 at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center. Merényi served slow-cooked beef with transitional Hungarian accompaniments for 600 guests and a panel of celebrity judges. The annual event benefits Cultural Tourism DC, an independent coalition of more than 230 community-based organizations which showcases the city’s rich and diverse culture and heritage. [gallery ids="100613,100624,100623,100622,100621,100620,100619,100618,100617,100616,100615,100614,100625" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Ambassador of Costa Rica Muni Figueres, the honorary patron at the Latino Student Fund’s 12th Annual Gala at the Organization of American States, lauded the fund on March 14 as a fantastic vehicle for the vindication of the Latin spirit. This year’s theme “Color Caribe” highlighted Costa Rica with its Latin music, cocktails and food. Festivities benefitted the LSF’s mission to provide academic opportunities for students of Hispanic/Latino descent from pre-Kindergarten to 12th grade and to promote higher education and professional leadership. [gallery ids="100626,100627,100628,100629,100630,100631,100632,100633" nav="thumbs"]

Robert Devaney •

In 1791, Pierre-Charles L’Enfant arrived in Georgetown on the evening of March 9 to begin work on the soon-to be nation’s capital, Washington, D.C. The Mayor of Georgetown had not gotten the memo, and L’Enfant felt less than welcomed and complained to Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson. In recent decades, Washingtonians have been making up for that with an ongoing annual “Welcome, Pierre!” reception. Friends and history lovers raised a toast the city’s designer March 9 at Dumbarton House, headquarters for The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America.

Robert Devaney •

In tune with D.C.’s cherry blossoms, Bonhams Auctioneers and Appraisers held a preview of some of the art, ranging from Japan and China to Southeast Asia, being shown at Asia Week in New York at its Washington office on M Street in Georgetown March 8. Martin Gammon, who heads up the D.C. and Mid-Atlantic division, welcomed art lovers and a few Sackler Gallery trustees to the first highlights preview and reception at his Bonhams office. [gallery ids="100634,100635" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner • April 19, 2012

House 1
1688 31st Street, N.W.

This dignified, three-story Victorian, built around 1800, was the home of Sen. Robert Taft (R-Ohio) from 1941 until his death in 1953. Taft is best known as co-sponsor of the federal Taft-Hartley Act of 1947.
The house’s most prominent features are its high ceilings and many tall windows.  In the early 1960’s, the owners added a spacious living room.  Double sets of doors lead from the living room to a walled garden and pool. Off the large entrance hall are a striking library with a wet bar and a fireplace, a kitchen, an elegant powder room, a dining room and finally the living room.

House 2
3007 Q Street, N.W.

This large post-Civil War, semi-detached residence is one of eight “villas” built beginning in 1868 by Henry J. Cooke for his 12 children.  Cooke was the first territorial governor of the District of Columbia and brother of Jay Cooke, a financier and close friend of President Ulysses S. Grant. The exuberant design by Starkweather & Plowman combined aspects of the Italianate villa with elements of Second Empire style. Built on what was then the edge of Georgetown, these houses were shunned at first by the public as being rather too ornate and grandiose for their time during the post-Civil War era.

In 1932, the family of L.P. Shippen purchased the house, and it became the venue for her celebrated dance academy. The current owners have recently undertaken a painstaking two-year renovation, retaining original architectural details, such as the seemingly free-floating spiral staircase.

House 3
1352 28th Street, N.W.

Built around 1810 and first recorded in 1818 (when it was owned by William Lipscomb, a post office clerk, and assessed at $2,000), this red-brick house was originally a two-story building in the Federal style with two dormer windows facing the street. The house has changed hands many times over 200 years.  Its modern aspect, though, is attributable to changes made for a client in 1968 by the renowned architect Hugh Newell Jacobsen.

Jacobsen removed much of the non-original construction and built a new living room and library with several bedrooms upstairs, leaving the dining room and the stair hall as the only “old” rooms. A glass façade was installed leading from the living room onto the small garden forecourt, which was walled in. This façade affords abundant light to the living room as well as a garden view.  

House 4
3106 P Street, N.W.

This substantial residence was built in 1877.  In 1938, it was acquired by Marcella Comès Winslow, a painter, with her husband, Col. William Randolph Winslow.  Marcella wrote “Brushes with the Literary, Letters of a Washington Artist 1943-1959,” a book in which she described life in Georgetown and the literary figures with whom she socialized. Among other positions, Winslow served as Portraitist to the Poetry Chair of the Library of Congress.

Her Georgetown home was an informal literary salon for such authors as Katherine Anne Porter, Robert Penn Warren and Eudora Welty. Porter was a boarder at the home. Winslow knew many famous authors, including T. S. Eliot, Robert Frost, Ezra Pound and Dylan Thomas, many of whom sat for her portraits. Today’s owners transformed the house by adding the eat-in kitchen in the back and connecting the garden to the house through a series of repeating arch designs that bridge the space seamlessly from interior to exterior.  

House 5
3104 P  Street, N.W.

This is one of four townhouses built in 1877 as a unit now comprising 3100-3106 P Street. Together, they form a fine example of the post-Civil War Victorian housing that drew many middle-class families to Georgetown.  Originally, each house had a completely separate garden, but recently two of the houses were joined by gates allowing free access for neighbors to visit.

The original floor plan was modified in 1998. A ground-floor guest bathroom was added, and the kitchen was enlarged to accommodate a dining space.  Steps link the new kitchen to the garden designed by Clarke Associates of London.  The sculpted wisteria was created by Husband and Clark, another English firm. Back inside, an unpretentious, European-infused aesthetic prevails.  

House 6
3141 P  Street, N.W.

This home is a Second Empire-style brick row house constructed around 1876 as one of a subdivision of three houses (3141-3145 P Street), owned by Joseph L. Simms. Adjacent to the property, east and north, is the historic Bowie-Sevier estate.

Its most recent renovation occurred in 2011 to accommodate all eight members of a blended family in a relaxed, family-friendly environment.  The current owners merged three separate rooms on the first floor into an open floor-plan, renovated the lower level to feature a new family room for teenagers and added a seventh bedroom. The kitchen is particularly remarkable and has a nautical feel.  

House 7
1416 34th Street, N.W.

This Italianate-style house, known as the Wetzel-Graves home, was built in 1876 by John Wetzel, a butter merchant, and sold in 1907 to Charles Graves, who ran his coal business from the home until the 1940s and whose family owned it after his death until the 1960s.  It is a perfect example of Georgetown’s middle-Victorian period architecture.  

Working with local architect Dale Overmyer, the current owners have renovated the house extensively, while taking care to preserve its historic properties.

House 8
1413 35th Street, N.W.

Built in the 1830s as a Federal frame house, this semi-detached house was converted in the 1940s by decorator Margaret Weller into a flat-front English Regency-style house.  An English basement entry was carved out of the front yard to replace the original stoop entry.

In 2005, architect Christian Zapatka renovated the house. Preserving the 1940s street façade, he gutted the interior and reconfigured the garden façade. The new side-oriented staircase leads up to the “piano nobile” (the main floor).  The living room across the back of the house leads directly to a limestone terrace through three sets of tall French doors.  Beyond the terrace is a stepped garden in the Italian style. Towering overhead is a 250-year-old Osage orange tree, one of the largest in the area.

House 9
1505 35th Street, N.W.

This attractive, spacious townhouse with five bedrooms and five-and-a-half baths is relatively new by Georgetown standards, having been built in 1964 on land (possibly the site of a former stable) that was subdivided from the next door property, a brick mansion that dates from 1852.

Working with Chryssa Wolfe of Hanlon Design Build, the owners have put a bright, airy California stamp on the interior of the house. They painted the plain red-brick exterior a soft almond-bisque color, while keeping the shutters grey.  The former solarium became a cozy family room. [gallery ids="100739,121551,121546,121513,121540,121521,121534,121529" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner •

Hope Connections for Cancer Support marked its fifth anniversary at its Celebration of Hope Gala at the World Bank.  Founding board member Bob Fleshner was presented with the Celebration of Hope Award and Louis Weiner, M.D., director of the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, received the Partnership Award. Hope Connections for Cancer Support opened in 2007 in Bethesda as the Wellness Community–Greater Washington, D.C.  It has since had more than 25,000 visits from cancer patients and caregivers who have participated in free support groups, educational workshops, mind/body classes and community programs.  [gallery ids="100741,121554" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner •

As Ambassador and Mrs. Sarukhan hosted supporters of Noche de Pasión 2012 at a special evening for the Washington Ballet’s final program of the season at their residence on Apr. 3, the ambassador cautioned, “Practice your Spanish.” The event co-chaired by Pilar Frank-O’Leary and Isabel de la Cruz Ernst on May 11 will benefit the Hispanic artists and community engagement programs of the Washington Ballet. The ambassador said that giving back to the community was a “no brainer.” [gallery ids="102444,121348,121341,121366,121355,121359" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner •

Mickey’s Backstage at Rivers at the Watergate and theatreWashington celebrated the 28th Helen Hayes Award nominees Apr. 9. Immersed in theatre, theatreWashington board chairman Victor Shargai said his relocation to Washington was “partly to get away from theatre.” Little did he imagine the vibrancy that makes our stages second only to Broadway. The awards will be presented Apr. 23. [gallery ids="100742,121612,121557,121604,121597,121591,121565,121575,121583" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner • April 18, 2012

Joan Bradley Wages, president and CEO of the National Women?s History Museum, which hopes to locate on the National Mall, celebrated women?s history at the home of D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities chair Judith Terra, on Apr. 3.? Guests included several ambassadors, reporter Eleanor Clift and Pamela Gordon-Banks, first woman premier of Bermuda and Judith?s daughter-in-law.? Guest speaker Jane Harman, president, CEO and executive director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, promised, ?We will get the museum built . . . just can?t promise when!?