Rosewood Washington, D.C.

“Boutique Charm”

We live in the area but choose this property a few times a year for special getaways. Ismail, assistant director of rooms, is always fantastic and helps insure a wonderful visit. A little treat is often delivered, showing appreciation for our patronage, which is very much appreciated. We needed hel… more

We live in the area but choose this property a few times a year for special getaways. Ismail, assistant director of rooms, is always fantastic and helps insure a wonderful visit. A little treat is often delivered, showing appreciation for our patronage, which is very much appreciated. We needed help securing a reservation and the hotel came through. The valet is always welcoming and helpful too. We will be back soon. Thank you for taking such good care of us.

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“CUT restaurant is great”

Had dinner a the Cut restaurant with friends we really enjoyed our time there and we had an amazing experience, I highly recommend it. Great service and atmosphere. Thank you to the staff and the chef. Great menu for food. A must in Washington DC.

“Great hotel but for your money you can do better”

This hotel is centrally located in Georgetown. The breakfast at the hotel is excellent. Rooms are spacious and clean, and bathrooms are very nice. The hotel is quite small and lacks proper seating along with a rather small front desk. This hotel is unfortunately not the best in Washington and you c… more

This hotel is centrally located in Georgetown. The breakfast at the hotel is excellent. Rooms are spacious and clean, and bathrooms are very nice. The hotel is quite small and lacks proper seating along with a rather small front desk. This hotel is unfortunately not the best in Washington and you can put your money in better places.

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“Very nice hotel, but has some room for service improvement”

I stayed at the Rosewood Washington, DC for one night on a Saturday in early January with my wife, infant, and dog, and overall, we enjoyed this hotel. The intimate, boutique feel was really nice and unique for a Rosewood, and we found our room to be well appointed and very comfortable. The quiet, … more

I stayed at the Rosewood Washington, DC for one night on a Saturday in early January with my wife, infant, and dog, and overall, we enjoyed this hotel. The intimate, boutique feel was really nice and unique for a Rosewood, and we found our room to be well appointed and very comfortable. The quiet, yet still convenient location within Georgetown was also great. Despite all of the positives, we did find service to be lacking a little bit, and was simply not as polished as expected for a hotel of this caliber. Pre-Arrival: We made our reservation on very short notice, deciding only a day before our arrival to book a room at the Rosewood that weekend. We booked through a travel agent in the Rosewood Elite program, which enabled us to get free perks (I highly recommend doing this). For no additional cost, our reservation included a room upgrade based on availability at check-in, a welcome amenity, a one-time $100 hotel credit, and a $70 breakfast credit, which could be used in the hotel restaurant or for in-room dining. I was generally impressed with the communication we received before our arrival. When our travel agent communicated our anticipated morning arrival to the hotel, they immediately confirmed an early check-in at any time we wanted to arrive, and that we had already been blocked into an upgraded Rosewood Suite (which was a one category upgrade from the Premier King Room that we had reserved). Since early January is not a particularly busy time there, I really appreciated that they took the opportunity to confirm all of that in advance when they had the availability to do so, rather than making us wait for check-in to find out. When traveling with a baby and dog, having that certainty in advance was very appreciated. I also had a quick email exchange with the front desk the night before we arrived, in which they assisted with making a dining reservation at CUT. I also reminded them that we were traveling with a baby and a dog (something our travel agent had also done), and they responded to tell me that was noted and that amenities for both the baby and the dog would be provided in our room. There was a lack of follow-through on this that was ultimately disappointing. Arrival: We arrived at the hotel around 11:30 am on a Saturday morning, and the hotel entrance was completely dead at the time, which didn’t make a great first impression. There was no doorman or anyone else around, so my wife took my daughter inside to find out what to do with our car. Once she went in, a doorman/valet was located and came out. He was friendly and helpful, but seemed a bit harried and stressed. It seemed that he was the only one working as the doorman, bellman, and valet all in one, which explained why the hotel entrance was left unattended at times. These roles seemed understaffed throughout our stay. Even though this hotel is small, with only about 50 rooms, there should still be enough separate staff members to fill these basic roles, and it should definitely not be one person doing all of it. This also led to a lot of inconsistency throughout the stay at the entrance. Sometimes we’d be greeted with the door held open, while the entrance was empty at other times. In line with having a more boutique feel, the lobby space on the ground level was small and cozy, with dark wood and gas fireplaces on. After passing through the entrance, CUT Steakhouse is to your immediate right, and then straight ahead is a small area with a podium for check-in and the elevators to the rooms. The only seating is in a cozy little room with a fireplace, called the Library, that is separate and up a few stairs. I thought the front desk was poorly designed. There was just such limited space between the desk and the immediately adjacent elevators that it could get bottlenecked with people very easily. Check-in was fine, and the front desk employee who assisted us went over the inclusions in our room rate and welcomed us and our dog. As promised the day before, our room was ready and had been upgraded to a Rosewood Suite. Room: Rooms are located on floors 2 through 5, and each floor is relatively small with only a handful of rooms on it. We were on the 3rd floor (Room 306), and the room was great. The Rosewood Suite offered lots of space for a city hotel, which was perfect for us. It felt like a nice apartment in Georgetown more than a hotel room. It featured a separate living room and bedroom with a large bathroom off of the bedroom, in addition to a separate half bath when you first entered the room. The suite was very nicely decorated, with a sort of traditional feel using dark wood and traditional moldings, but with modern touches through things like the accessories and art. I understand that the rooms have not been renovated in a while, so I was impressed that it didn’t feel dated. We particularly appreciated the very comfortable bed with nice linens, as well as the bathroom, which was huge and featured a separate free-standing tub and very large shower, and a spacious vanity with double sinks. The bath products from Diptyque were a great high-end touch. It was nice that the suite was in a corner of the building, so it had windows on two sides. The only real view was from the living room, which had views of the C&O Canal and the building on the other side of the canal (the canal is currently drained and not much of a view). All of the windows on the other side of the room, which were in the bedroom and bathroom, unfortunately just looked out at a wall and a roof. I think the views on that side would be better on the 4th or 5th floor, but not appreciably. As with many city hotels, there aren’t really any amazing views here. Since the hotel isn’t a particularly tall building, you’re just going to be looking at adjacent buildings or streets. The rooftop, however, has great views worth checking out. One suggestion for improvement we had in regard to the room was to have more water available. There were only two tiny eight-ounce boxes of water in the room (and two more left at turndown), and otherwise only the water in the minibar for a fee. We did notice that the gym had a refrigerator filled with these same waters, so you can always go there to restock. We also wished some of the features in the room had worked better. For example, the light switches have multiple options, including to turn on the lights fully or to have a “mood lighting” feature. The living room mood feature wasn’t working. We also found the wifi to be a bit spotty and hard to use. My devices would constantly disconnect from it, and the signal wasn’t very strong. Finally, we noticed that the thermostat indicated that the air filters on the HVAC system were overdue for replacement, which wasn’t surprising once we found ourselves sneezing a lot more than usual in the room. The doors between the rooms and hallway seemed to be a bit thin, as we frequently heard noise from the hallway in our room, such as doors of other rooms closing, and the elevator dings, even though the elevator was at the opposite end of the floor from our room. It wasn’t a major issue, particularly since our suite had a separate door to the bedroom we could close at night. Had we not been in such a large/insulated room, however, that aspect might have been more of a problem. Housekeeping generally did a fine job, although we did find a hair clip from a previous guest in a pretty obvious spot in the living room when we arrived. However, everything else was spotless, and they did a good job with turndown at night. We requested it at a specific time when we knew we’d be out of the room, and appreciated that it was completed when we returned. We also appreciated certain amenities we received, such as a dog bed, bowls, and a toy for our dog that were delivered shortly after check-in, as well as a very good dessert and welcome note that were delivered for us later that afternoon. It was disappointing, however, that we never received the promised baby amenities. The hotel advertises a variety of items they can provide for kids, and we had confirmed twice before arrival that these would be provided, including both through our travel agent and through our own emails with the hotel. We were surprised these items never showed up. None of it was crucial, but would certainly have been nice to have. If we had been staying longer, we would have followed-up about it, but since we were only there for one night, it hardly seemed worth it. Service: Service at the Rosewood Washington, DC was fine, and we didn’t have any particularly negative encounters, but it was also one area where there is potential for improvement. Staff members were generally nice, and certainly did the basics like saying hello when they saw us, but there were also some minor gaps and situations where we felt the service could be better. For example, the missed baby amenities were one thing that shows lack of coordination internally, and the lack of proper staffing at the door/valet was a clear example of understaffing, even though the guys who worked at the door were very nice and helpful when we interacted with them. At one point, the doorman saw me coming with two coffees, and knowing that I’d have trouble getting into the elevator (which requires a room key to get to your floor), he ran ahead and got the elevator set for me, which was great service. Some of the staff members at the front desk seemed a bit under-trained and didn’t have authority to do basic things. I stopped at the front desk in the evening to ask if we’d be able to have a slightly late check-out the next day, something that seemed like it would be no problem given that the hotel didn’t seem to have high occupancy at the time. However, I was told they weren’t sure if we could have it, and that we should check-in with the person working the next shift. We did that and were granted the late checkout, but I would have expected a bit better at a Rosewood. Another time, we had our ‘do not disturb’ sign up while our daughter was napping and we were in the room, but a staff member still knocked and then entered the room to deliver our welcome amenity. It was odd that the ‘do not disturb’ sign wasn’t better respected. She didn’t ring the loud doorbell, which I guess was a plus, but I was also surprised she was knocking and coming in at all given that we had indicated we didn’t want to be disturbed (and there are clear lights in the hallway to indicate your selection). Dining & Bars: The hotel’s only restaurant is CUT Steakhouse by Wolfgang Puck, which is off of the lobby. It’s a nice space with a large bar, lounge, and dining room, all light and bright with windows looking out at the canal. This is probably the third luxury hotel we’ve been to in the past year that has CUT as its main restaurant, so it’s not particularly unique or existing, but this was the first time we actually tried it. We had Sunday Brunch at CUT, and it was a great experience. Our server was great, and brunch featured a nice menu that included a variety of breakfast items, but also the various steaks that the restaurant is known for. The endive Caesar salad was great, as was the DC Benedict that used a biscuit and pork belly instead of the standard eggs benedict items. We also really liked the option to add an unlimited beverage package at brunch. There was one option at $45 per person for a more basic set of drink options (champagne, bloody marys or mimosas, wine selections, and beers), or a higher package for $95 per person for more premium options, such as Veuve Clicquot, liquor, and a couple of the restaurant’s signature cocktails. Since the lower option still had a champagne on the menu, we went with that and enjoyed it. Brunch was pretty dead when we were there, which surprised me, since the food and service were great, and the beverage package was a fun add-on. The other dining option is CUT Above, the hotel’s rooftop lounge. We visited the lounge in the evening, which was nicely tented and heated in the winter, and still had a fun alpine/Christmas theme while we visited in early January on a Saturday night. It was pretty popular that night, but not completely full. We were told that the rooftop lounge does take reservations, but that it wouldn’t be necessary as hotel guests. We also had a good experience up there, enjoying their wine by the glass options and cocktails, as well as some of the snacks offered on the food bites menu. The soft pretzels and churros were both delicious. I thought the rooftop had a nice vibe, even in the winter, and would be even better in the summer, when you could really enjoy the weather and the views that the rooftop offers, which include the Kennedy Center and the Washington Monument. Other Amenities: The hotel amenities include a fitness center and pool that are on the rooftop level. The gym looked very tiny, but it did include some nice equipment like a Peloton bike and Peloton treadmill. The pool is right beyond the gym. It’s not that large, but sufficient for the size of hotel, and it was really nicely heated when we used it. The pool is indoor-outdoor, which was helpful in cold weather. The outdoor section has the same nice views as the rooftop lounge, which it’s right next to. I believe in warmer months, the glass wall would be pulled up and the whole pool would be mostly outdoor, with great views throughout. I was just glad that pool was even open in the winter and available to use. The pool area itself is a little odd, as the pool is raised up several steps from the ground, leaving an odd and drab space with two lounge chairs at the bottom of the steps. I believe that in the summer, a deck area right outside of the pool would be an extra option for a place to sit. In the winter, it’s more limited, but just having a heated pool to use in the winter was nice, and I enjoyed some time in there with my daughter. Otherwise, the only negative with the pool was that the area didn’t look like it was looked after that well. There were only two towels there, which was all we needed, but after us, the next guest might not have had any towels available. There was also some trash and leftover items from previous guests in the pool area, so it just didn’t seem like it had the same attention as other areas in the hotel. Location: The Rosewood Washington DC is located nicely, right in the thick of Georgetown. It is only a block off of bustling M Street and all of its shopping and dining, and was about a 20-minute walk to Georgetown University. The neighborhood is really lovely and great to walk around, which we enjoyed doing. I liked how quiet the area immediately surrounding the hotel itself was, while still being so convenient to the busier parts of the neighborhood. Due to lack of connection to the Metro, Georgetown may not be the easiest location for touring DC more broadly, but I would be willing to stay here and take an Uber to other places, just to have a home base in such a nice area. Overall: The Rosewood DC was a very nice spot for a quick night away in January. We loved our upgraded suite, and found the hotel to be a nice and cozy boutique-feeling property. We would definitely stay here again, with hopes that some of the minor service issues get resolved.

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