I just spent a night here and am mixed.

First, the good. I was very impressed with the physical property and the location. And someone much older that I invited over for drinks had fond memories of time on the roof of this place many moons ago, so it has some history. The rooms are nice, but the workmanship on some items is closer to "Aloft" than "St Regis" if you know what I mean (tile work, caulking, etc). I got a great upgrade to a 2 room suite facing the Washington Monument, that was great. The staff also were very good at accomodating last minute requests, they found us a reserved table upstairs for drinks (the lounge on the first floor was WAY too loud) and then somewhat helped us out for dinner.

And that's where the negatives come in. The lobby bar is like a club, I used to love W lobbies, but recent stays in Atlanta and now this really have me feeling old! So we had to move upstairs, I mean we couldnt even hear each other yelling in the lobby. When we were given a table upstairs (great view table by the way) I asked the hostess if she could call down and get us a table for 3 at J&G at pretty much any time that night. She came back about mid-drink and told us we were all set for 7:30. Imagine our surprise when we got down to J&G and they said they had no reservation and could not accomodate us! The part that pissed me off is that the very young hostess at J&G didnt even have the sense to call upstairs and determine that someone had screwed up. So we are left standing there as if we were trying to crash the place. I told her that one day she'd have the skill to negotiate something like this better and that in the meantime I'd appreciate a table in the wine bar or else things were going to get ugly. I still am floored at this and if we hadnt made plans with a third person to meet there I would have gone somewhere else. We got a table in the winebar and truth be told, I liked the environment there more anyway (and you can get the J&G menu down there too).

I tried many several times during my stay to use the Acura "wheels" for a shuttle, but no dice. First time, "oh it's 9:45am and we dont make the acura available until 11am." Second request was also shot down, "it only can be used for trips within the district" and my trip was a few blocks beyond. Oh well, I can't complain, except that none of that is on the card they gave me at checkin telling me how cool this free service would be. If I stay there again I will come back again at lunch just to take a spin around the block in that thing!

Overall, I really liked the roof top lounge and the location of the property, but the brand seems to be pushing down into the lower 20s more, and also into a more "club" scene. I guess I'm getting old, I find myself gravitating to St Regis and Park Hyatt more and more!