Kalorama Mansion Walk

As you're getting off of the metro follow for signs to for the North Qst NW Exit. Note as you take your escalator ride up the surrounding granite is inscribed with a portion of Walt Whitman's 1865 poem The Wound Dresser in honor of Washington DC caregivers during the HIV crisis.

Stop at this cozy cafe & gelato shop for a treat to take along your walk. From here go any direction you'd like to reach tagged locations. You can't go wrong, there is something interesting to see on almost every street in this neighborhood, especially in the more residential streets. If you've got the time, zig and zag your way through this beautiful, quiet oasis in the middle of DC. You'll see handfuls of others doing the same.

This is an ideal starting point if you'd like to focus on seeing mansions and beautiful residents. Keep in mind that this is a real neighborhood. One that is home to many high level public figures and private citizens. Many of the homes and Embassy's are equipped with security, including secret service. Like many sites in DC it's safe to assume you're being watched as you visit. Please be respectful.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens.

A permanent marker for the French ambassador's home.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens. Notice the park police at the entry of Belmont Road? They're there to protect the entry of the Obama's private residents.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens. Notice the park police at the entry of Belmont Road? They're there to protect the entry of the Obama's private residents.

A stunning mosque that when built in 1957 was the largest mosque in the western hemisphere.

Private Residence - tagged for its proximity to many beautiful homes and gardens.

-Free entry to Exhibition -1-hour guided tours $10 The home Woodrow and Edith Wilson retired to after leaving the white house in 1921. *"Completed in 1916, the Wilson’s new, very modern home and stately gardens were designed in the Georgian Revival style by renowned architect Waddy Butler Wood—who also designed the home next door. Originally built as the private residence for Henry Parker Fairbanks, an executive at the Bigelow Carpet Company, the S Street house combines classic design with then-modern necessities. Along with a marble entryway and grand staircase, Palladian window, book-lined study, and a solarium overlooking the formal garden, the house also boasts a dumbwaiter and butler’s pantry, a telephone intercom system, and a kitchen stocked with the latest gadgets of the day. The S Street house has been maintained much as it was in 1924, including furniture, art, photographs, state gifts, and the personal effects of President and Mrs. Wilson. The drawing room includes a century-old Steinway piano that President Wilson had in the White House, a framed mosaic that he received on his trip to Italy in 1919 from Pope Benedict XV, and a wall-sized Gobelin tapestry presented by the people of France following World War I. Before President and First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama, the Wilsons were the only President and First Lady to make Washington their permanent home after leaving office. In retirement, the Wilsons received dignitaries and guests at the home, including former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George and former French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau." *From Wilson House Website

*"Constructed in 1911 at the height of the City Beautiful movement in Washington, D.C., the Decatur Terrace Steps and Fountain were a project of the District of Columbia Municipal Office of Public Works and Grounds. Constructed on a steep slope in the Kalorama neighborhood, the steps were intended to provide a pedestrian link between S Street and Decatur Place on a route thought too steep for vehicles. It is the only Washington public park that occupies a street. Designed by architect Robert E. Cook, the broad concrete staircase has four levels. It is widest at its low, southern terminus near Decatur Place, transitioning upwards towards a shallow brick terrace and a second tier of stairs bordered by planting beds. Twin balustrade-lined steps curve around an oval-shaped basin containing a lion-head fountain before connecting to a broad brick terrace on S Street. The entire area is lined with a mix of magnolias, eastern red cedars, oaks, and other flowering trees. Due to severe erosion and a car collision that destroyed the original stone balustrade and fountain, this unique public landscape was restored and rehabilitated in 1999. The steps are listed in the National Register of Historic Places as a contributing feature in the Sheridan-Kalorama Historic District, designated in 1989." *From tclf.org

-Advance reservations recommended -$20 entry for adults -Pay-what-you-wish admission daily from 4 pm to close *Founded by Duncan Phillips and Marjorie Acker Phillips in 1921 as the Phillips Memorial Gallery artists represented in the collection are Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Gustave Courbet, El Greco, Vincent van Gogh, Henri Matisse, Claude Monet, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Pierre Bonnard, Paul Klee, Arthur Dove, Winslow Homer, James McNeill Whistler, Jacob Lawrence, Augustus Vincent Tack, Georgia O'Keeffe, Karel Appel, Joan Miró, Mark Rothko and Berenice Abbott. *From Wikipedia

The oldest social club in DC The Cosmo Club has seen memberships from three US Presidents, two VP's, 36 Nobel Prize Winners, 61 Pulitzer Prize winners, US Supreme Court Justices, and countless artists, businessmen, and public officials. Founded in 1878, it started as a club for gentlemen that were interested in the advancement of n science, literature, and art. At its founding it was exclusively and men's only club until 1988 when the club was opened to women for membership.

-Free Entry -Free Daily Tours *In the spring of 1905, Anderson House was completed and took its place as one of the capital city’s most fashionable mansions—a “Florentine villa in the midst of American independence” as a local newspaper declared. The firm of Arthur Little and Herbert Browne of Boston designed the mansion as the winter residence of Larz Anderson, an American diplomat, and his wife, Isabel, an author and philanthropist. For more than thirty years, the couple enjoyed their Washington home as a showcase for their art collection, a backdrop for high society galas, and a home from which they explored what they considered “the most beautiful of American cities.” At a cost of nearly $750,000, Anderson House included a walled garden, tennis court, and three-story carriage house and stable. The fifty-room mansion is Little & Browne’s finest architectural achievement. Its eclectic interiors, dominated by English and Italian influences, feature the painstaking work of craftsmen who adorned the house with carved wood walls, gilded papier-mâché ceilings, ornate iron staircases, and intricate marble floors. Anderson House was also outfitted with all the latest conveniences, including electricity, central heat, telephones, and two elevators. Larz and Isabel Anderson intended their Washington home to be a grand setting where the rising diplomat could entertain American and foreign dignitaries. The Andersons would distinguish themselves among the capital’s most sought-after hosts. During the Washington social season—generally between New Year’s Day and Easter—the Andersons held diplomatic and inaugural receptions, formal dinners and luncheons, concerts, and dramatic performances. Their guest lists included Presidents William H. Taft and Calvin Coolidge, Gen. John J. Pershing, Henry A. du Pont, and members of the Vanderbilt family. To the Andersons, their Washington home represented the culmination of what America’s founders, including George Washington, hoped their capital city would become—a grand, modern city to rival European capitals, but with a patriotic identity and a sense of history that would make it distinctly American. When Larz Anderson died in 1937 with no children, his widow oversaw the gift of Anderson House and its contents to the Society of the Cincinnati, of which Larz had been a devoted member. Since 1939, this National Historic Landmark has been open to the public as a historic house museum where the Society has continued the traditions of collecting, entertaining, and patriotic service that the Andersons began one hundred years ago. *from the Anderson House Website