Original 1918 hotel structure The original hotel on the site was built between 1917 and 1918 by local developer
Harry Wardman and was designed by local architect
Frank Russell White. It was an eight-story, red brick structure modeled on
The Homestead resort in Virginia. The hotel was the largest in the city, with 1,200 rooms and 625 baths. It was nicknamed ''Wardman's Folly'', due to its location far outside the developed area of Washington at the time. on November 23, 1918, just days after the 1918
Armistice ended
World War I. No elaborate opening festivities were held, since public gatherings were illegal during the
Spanish flu pandemic. The hotel was hugely successful due to the housing shortage caused by the growth of
Washington, D.C., during World War I. It attracted prominent guests and tenants; foreign ambassadors, members of Congress, and Vice President Marshall took up residence. The hotel contained a full-service
drug store/pharmacy; the pharmacist was known as Doc Wardman. There was also a
U.S. Post Office and shops in the basement, including a butcher, grocery store, and dry cleaner that was stocked even during World War II. In the late 1940s, the
Olympic-size swimming pool was used by the 5th
Marine Reserves, who were taught how to swim with their clothes on. The first televised broadcast of
NBC's
Meet the Press took place in 1947 in the Wardman Tower, where host
Lawrence Spivak lived. Other shows broadcast from the hotel include
The Camel News Caravan,
The Today Show (
Frank Blair segments), and
The Arthur Murray Dance Program. In 1953,
Sheraton Hotels purchased Washington Properties Inc., owner of the Wardman Park Hotel and the Wardman-built
Carlton Hotel. Renamed the
Sheraton-Park Hotel, its focus shifted from longer-term residents to overnight guests. In 1977, the company presented plans to local residents groups for a modern, 1,050-room hotel to be built on the 12-acre property. Construction began in early 1979. The furniture and fittings of the original 950-room 1918 structure were sold to the public in June 1979 The 500 rooms in the Wardman Tower and Motor Inn wings remained open throughout construction. The new wing was fully completed and opened in August 1980. On Election Night 1980, President
Jimmy Carter conceded his landslide election loss to
Ronald Reagan with a speech in the hotel ballroom. In 1985, John Hancock bought out Sheraton's remaining interest in the hotel, but paid the chain to continue managing the property. In August 1997, John Hancock filed a breach-of-contract suit against the hotel chain, by then renamed ITT Sheraton, alleging mismanagement of the hotel. In March 1998, a federal judge in Delaware ordered ITT Sheraton to withdraw as manager of the hotel.
Marriott International took over management of the property that month, renaming it the
Marriott Wardman Park Hotel. In January 1999, Thayer Lodging Group of
Annapolis, Maryland, run by two former Marriott executives, purchased the hotel from John Hancock for $227 million and spent another $100 million on renovations. In 2005, Thayer Lodging Group sold the hotel to
JBG Smith and
CIM Group for $300 million. JBG planned to convert a portion of the hotel into luxury condominiums and construct a 200-unit condominium building on a lot next to the hotel. JBG also said it would demolish the hotel's parking garage and main ballroom, and spend $50 million to renovate the guest rooms, add dining space, build a new fitness center, and improve the exhibition and meeting space. Marriott, which managed the hotel, had the right to veto the conversion of hotel rooms into condos if revenues on the remaining hotel section fell below a specified number. Hotel revenues declined during the
Great Recession, and Marriott exercised its right to stop the conversion of the hotel into condominiums. On March 29, 2010,
Superior Court of the District of Columbia Judge Natalia Combs Greene granted partial summary judgment and a motion to dismiss. A partial out-of-court settlement had already been reached by the parties giving JBG some limited ability to move forward on the condo project, but that agreement now seemed unnecessary given the court's ruling. The parties suspended litigation against one another to negotiate, but litigation resumed on June 8, 2010. The parties in the various lawsuits resolved their legal dispute on July 1, 2010, allowing construction to resume. After the collapse of the housing market during the
2008 financial crisis, JBG decided to construct an apartment building on the vacant acreage rather than condominiums. In 2015, JBG renovated floors 3 to 8 of the Wardman Tower into 32 luxury condominiums, while the first and second floors remained part of the hotel business. The project was financed by $54 million from North America Sekisui House LLC (NASH), the North American division of the largest homebuilding corporation in
Japan. One of the condominium units sold for $8.4 million. In January 2018, JBG Group and CIM Group, which had owned roughly equal interests in the hotel, sold a controlling interest in the property (66.67%) to
Pacific Life, with JBG and CIM each retaining 16.67% ownership. In February 2020,
CIM Group sold its interest in the hotel. In March 2020, the hotel closed temporarily, due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. On June 22, 2020, the hotel's owners notified the workers' union that they might close the hotel permanently. On September 3, 2020, Pacific Life petitioned in a Delaware court to dissolve its ownership partnership with JBG. The two companies resolved their dispute on October 2, 2020. On October 6, 2020, Marriott sued Pacific Life (which owned 80% of the property) and JBG Smith (which owned 20%). Marriott claimed the two companies were intentionally failing to invest contractually obligated capital in the hotel to force the property to close so it could be redeveloped, cheating Marriott of fees to be earned from its long-term management contract. On January 11, 2021, the owning entity, Pacific Life subsidiary Wardman Hotel Owner LLC, filed for bankruptcy, announced that the hotel would be closed permanently, and ended its management contract with Marriott. In December 2021, the property was sold in a 192-round bankruptcy auction which opened in 2025. ==Residents==