L'Enfant Plaza Hotel

The L'Enfant Plaza Hotel is a hotel located in downtown Washington, D.C., in the United States. It was designed by architect Vlastimil Koubek, and named after Pierre Charles L'Enfant, the first surveyor and designer of the street layout of the city. It was inaugurated on May 31, 1973. The hotel is listed as a Mobile 4-star and AAA 4-Diamond Luxury Hotel.The L'Enfant Plaza Hotel sits atop L'Enfant Plaza, an esplanade and plaza structure erected above a highway and a parking garage in the Southwest quadrant of the District of Columbia. The plaza and hotel were approved in 1955, but construction did not begin on the plaza (on which the hotel sits) until 1965. The plaza and esplanade were completed in 1968. The start of construction on the hotel was delayed three years, and was completed in May 1973. The construction led to a lawsuit after it was found that the foundation of an adjoining structure had encroached on the hotel's property. The hotel suffered a serious fire in 1975 that claimed the lives of two people.L'Enfant Plaza Corp., which owned the hotel, sold the structure to Sarakreek Holdings in 1998, which in turn sold it to the JBG Companies in 2003. A legal battle ensued over the hotel's ownership. The hotel's long-time operator, Loews Hotels, was replaced by Crestline Hotels & Resorts in 2005, which was in turn replaced by the Davidson Hotel Company in 2010. The L'Enfant Plaza Hotel features 372 guest rooms, 36 larger "Executive Rooms", and several suites on the top four floors of a 12-story mixed-use building. The hotel has two main restaurants and two bars among its many amenities.The L'Enfant Plaza Hotel closed on December 3, 2013, for what was to be a year-long overhaul and upgrade of the entire property. It is set to reopen in 2018 as the Hilton Washington DC National Mall.