The new rooftop lounge at the Hyatt House Washington, D.C. Downtown Convention Center opening next month includes “Seychellois cuisine” on the menu.
Standing out among D.C.’s growing list of rooftop bars and restaurants takes more than just sweeping views of the city, and the new rooftop lounge at the Hyatt House Washington, D.C. Downtown Convention Center opening next month includes “Seychellois cuisine” on the menu.
Realm Rooftop Bar & Lounge is at the hotel, which is located at 899 O Street, NW, and it straddles the Shaw neighborhood and D.C.’s convention center.
Realm is as much an indoor lounge and restaurant as it is outdoor, with a large patio and fire pits. Hotel general manager Donte Johnson said it has been designed to create a one-of-a-kind atmosphere with a “sophisticated yet relaxed vibe” unlike anything in the city.
The menu may be one of the things that distinguishes it. Executive chef Keem Hughley’s menu blends French cuisine with flavors of the Indian Ocean. The menu refers to the Seychelles, the chain of islands in the Indian Ocean off East Africa, once a French territory in the 1700s before Great Britain took possession in the early 1800s.
The Seychelles became an independent nation in the 1970s, but retains English, French and Seychellois Creole as the official languages
Small plates include flavors like coconut, tamarind, citrus and curry leaf, with dishes that include oysters with coconut-lime-ginger mignonette, tamarin-gazed lamb chops, Wagyu sliders with mango chutney, coconut crab cakes and ginger-lemongrass chicken skewers.
Hyatt House is run by Donohoe Hospitality. The Realm Rooftop Bar & Lounge is open to hotel guests, business and locals.
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Hyrox is fast becoming one of the more popular ways to stay in shape with training for the race popping up all over the D.C. area.
Hyrox is a global indoor fitness competition with the event drawing more than 4,300 athletes to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center last March. (Courtesy Dhiraj Jagasia)
Hyrox is a global indoor fitness competition with the event drawing more than 4,300 athletes to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center last March. (Courtesy Dhiraj Jagasia)
Dubbed the “World Series” of fitness racing, Hyrox is fast becoming one of the more popular ways to stay in shape with training for the race popping up all over the D.C. area.
Hyrox is a global indoor fitness competition with the event — drawing more than 4,300 athletes to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center last March. It combines running and eight functional workouts in a standardized format. Each running portion of a kilometer is followed by a different exercise, including SkiErg, sled push and pull, burpee broad jumps, rowing, farmer’s carry, sandbag lunges and wall balls.
So why has it been gaining popularity in the fitness world?
The hype surrounding Hyrox
“Number one, it’s fun,” said Graham King, owner of Urban Athletic Club in Shaw. “The movements aren’t so high skill based so we are looking at sled pushes, wall balls and lunges and half the event is running, so if you can run you are halfway done.”
“Also, because the event is confined, your friends can cheer you on at every single station,” King added. “With Hyrox you are running around this track and everyone can see you. You go to your wall ball, you go to your rowing and your friends and family are cheering you on the whole time.”
Urban Athletic is one of many clubs in the D.C. area that holds Hyrox training classes and it offers athletes an alternative way to get and stay motivated. “It’s just the movements and it keeps my body oiled up,” said Urban Athletic Club member Tim Rutherford. “I feel like I am able to push myself more than I can with strict weight lifting.”
“I like the variety and I appreciate workouts where I work most of my body,” said Chad Russell, who also attends Urban Athletic Club. “If there is a moment in the workout where I hate my life but it doesn’t continue within 20 minutes of the workout, it was a perfect workout.”
Collectively getting better
Olga Gorodetsky is a coach at Urban Athletic Club and she is a fan of how training for Hyrox brings people together. “It really isn’t about top-ticking the other person. This really feels like a team-oriented community and it’s all about us collectively getting better,” Gorodetsky said. “I love Hyrox.”
Hyrox is open to all ages and levels and the setup is eight kilometers of running with eight workout stations.
Dhiraj Jagasia, 45, of Falls Church, Virginia, competed in the event last March in D.C. It was a 10 out 10, Jigasia said.
“I got my family out there and my friends cheering me on. It was top notch,” he said.
Jigasia said he did the Hyrox race to help him with other sports.
“I am an avid tennis player, and I moved up in the rankings, so I wanted to hang with the younger guys,” Jigasia said. “No matter what your goals are, this is something you can get better in terms of your overall health, your conditioning, and it will just help you live longer, I think.”
Clearly endurance is a huge part of Hyrox, so monthslong training is vital to any sort of success.
“I think the number one reason a lot of people, when it comes to fitness, may fail or give up, is they try to do it alone,” said Branden Jones, a D.C.-based trainer.
“It’s one of the things you really can’t do alone. You need some accountability, some community and that’s the best way to get this thing done.”
A 6-foot-wide, 600-square-foot listing in Northwest D.C. quickly went viral, with some amazed by the finished product and others criticizing the home.
With only a 6-feet-wide, 20 feet in length lot to work with, Virginia-based contractor Omnifics decided they could build a two-story home which could fit a bedroom, kitchen, living room and a bathroom.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
This 600-square-foot home doesn’t face the street, with a back entrance through a gate.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The 6-feet-wide home can’t fit a dining room table, but it does have a built-in breakfast bar.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The living room gets plenty of light, with windows surrounding the small sitting area.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The full bathroom upstairs features floor-to-ceiling porcelain tiles and a standing glass-walled shower.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The upstairs bedroom features a closet and space for bedside tables despite its diminutive size.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The 600-square-foot house still features outdoor space, with a five-foot-wide deck surrounded by wooden fencing.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The tiny house is tucked away on a side street, Glick Court, in the Northwest D.C. Shaw neighborhood.
(Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes)
Courtesy Andre Rowe/Jennifer Young Homes
The housing market has been tough, but in D.C.’s Shaw neighborhood one home may be someone’s chance to get into a brand-new single-family home. But there is a catch — it’s only six feet wide.
Nady Samnang, CEO of a contractor based out of Virginia called Omnifics, said when he and his brother had the opportunity to acquire the small lot at 1738 Glick Ct. NW, they knew it would be a tight area to build on. However, they thought they could make it work on a 14 to 15-feet-wide foundation.
“That original idea was supposed to be a four-level single family home,” Samnang said.
Then, after work had begun, he said the city threw a new challenge their way — approving a structure that was six feet wide, which is essentially the width of a driveway.
“We almost walked away at that point,” Samnang recalled.
But he said after talking with his brother and their team, they made the call to accept the challenge and got to work drawing up the plans for the 600-square-foot home.
He said with 45 feet in length to work with, they decided they could build a two-story home which could fit a bedroom, kitchen, living room and a bathroom. The next struggle was constructing the home in the tiny lot.
“When you have a 10,000-square-foot house, you’ve got plenty of room to bring in equipment to bring in crew to bring and all the materials, but here you see the lot, it’s basically a parking spot,” he said.
A year and a half after accepting the skinny home challenge, the home was built. Once listed, the listing quickly went viral, with some amazed by the finished product and others criticizing the home.
Samnang said he read the comments from the naysayers and encourages the critics, even if they are not interested in buying the home, to take a tour of the home, which is a proud accomplishment for his team.
“If we got one thing wrong, the entire house would have failed. But our architects and our builders and my brother, our crew, we really nailed it down to the centimeter,” he said.
He also believes the plans for this home could be a blueprint for developing more homes in smaller spaces. Samnang said some of his research included looking at similar homes built in cities like Seoul and Tokyo.
“I think what we need to do is think smaller, think micro-living, think simple living,” he said.
The home was originally listed at $630,000 and is now down to $599,900, but Samnang said he believes it will sell, when the right buyer is found.
“I’m looking for someone who maybe likes that high rise, condo/apartment-type feel but without the condo fee, without the HOA fee and without neighbors,” he said.
He also said with the slim footprint, it also has an outdoor space which is 5-feet wide.
Looking back he said he’s proud that they were able to bring the one bedroom, one-and-a-half bath home to life in that space, but joked this sort of project may be a one and done for him.
“I may never do something like that again, because it was just so hard to do,” Samnang said with a laugh.
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