The Graham Hotel Featured in Hospitality Design

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13
September

The Graham Hotel Featured in Hospitality Design

Hospitality Design takes an in-depth look at The Graham Hotel with BBGM Senior Principal Domenic Giordano, offering insight on the hotel’s design inspiration and some of the property’s unique historical aspects.

Located on a quiet side street in the heart of Georgetown, the Graham Hotel is polished to perfection. Just minutes from the waterfront and walking distance to upscale shops and restaurants, the Graham Hotel offers an elite, yet funky atmosphere to guests of this historic Washington, D.C., neighborhood.

An excerpt from the article:

A past filled with classic American characters naturally inspires the historic and quirky in Washington, DC’s Georgetown neighborhood. For the designer of the Graham, Domenic Giordano, principal of locally based BBGM, the aesthetic started with three different concepts and more than one famous name.

Formerly the Monticello, the hotel had some Jeffersonian detail that could have inspired the reimagining of the building. There was also a rumor that documentation had been found showing that Frank Sinatra had stayed in the hotel, according to Giordano. While the idea could have lent itself to a rat-pack cool, black and white theme, the design team doubted its authenticity in the possibly late-1950s or early-1960s build. “That date made me question the whole Frank Sinatra thing,” he adds.

“The owner eventually focused on essentially everyone’s idea of Georgetown,” Giordano says. Keeping with the hotel’s namesake, Alexander Graham Bell’s, who once lived in the area, the team began playing with a motif that reinterpreted that traditional Georgetown design. In the lobby, pieces like sink-in pincushion seating and a brown leather wingback chair tie together Art Deco design and modernism. A troublesome column was transformed into a “peek-a-boo wall for vases,” describes Giordano, referring to the framed holes housing funky pieces.

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