Neighborhood tour

This past weekend I visited the Washington Zoo (more on that later) and walked through one of my favorite neighborhoods on my walk home that I thought I'd share with you.
This part of washington is the residential part of the city. From the zoo you can walk along rock creek park which is in a gorge below these neighborhoods. I've always loved these enormous old decorative bridges that connect these neighborhood. This one spans between Woodley Park and Kalorama.
This iconic mural announces your entry into Woodley Park from Kalorama - recognize the face? Marilyn Monroe of course!
Crossing over the bridge, you come into Kalorama. Kalorama is home to many of the grandest homes in the city built around the turn of last century, many embassies and along Connecticut Ave and the other major roads these GRAND old apartment buildings. Much of the work my firm does is in this area.
This building has this marvelous gazebo on the roof that looks out over the park. I've always wanted to go up there! Also notice the beautifully ornate and colorful corbels under the roof and the surround of the front door -all terra cotta. My dream apartment would be a small one-bedroom up there overlooking the park (pipe-dream maybe, but practical size wise anyway!)

Another big beautiful apartment building - this one with a porte cochere. More beautiful terra cotta work!This is one of the more famous buildings - the Dresden. Notice the building curves - more of it faces the park this way, and also it fits the site better. These windows are HUGE.This one is an entire city block, I walked up once and peeked into the lobby -as ornate and beautiful as you could imagine! More rooftop gazebos!Just south of here is the famous curved hilton where Reagan was infamously shot. Not a very pretty building -but the first place I stayed in DC back in high school. Across from the hilton is this beautiful mansion -now offices. I would say that was a shame, except it must be dreadfully noisey inside with all the pedestrian and car traffic -it's on a major intersection. Now we're in dupont (that intersection i mentioned before is the border of neighborhoods). I've always been fascinated by this building you see here. It's nautically themed -notice the porthole windows and the lighthouse on top! The base houses a retro looking hair parlor and a bakery (firehook). This mansion is right on Dupont Circle. It's now a private club but at one time was the Robert Wilson Patterson mansion. Designed by McKim, Mead & white in 1900 -the exterior is all white terra cotta except for the marble columns on the 2nd floor. It houses Washington's first garage ( you can barely see it to the far left). The Patterson's lent the house to President and Mrs. Coolidge in 1927 while the White House was being renovated.

This last is close to my apartment right off Dupont Circle. It now houses the National Trust for historic presevation but was originally a very grand apartment building. Andrew Mellon (from the Pittsburgh banking family and one of the founders of Carnegie Mellon University, my alma mater) lived here while he was working as treasurer for the United States in the top 2 floors(he also was responsible for the John Russell Pope designed nat'l gallery of art, donating the building to the Smithsonian). Hope you enjoyed the tour!