Embassy Row is the informal name for a section of Northwest Washington, D.C., with a high concentration of embassies, diplomatic missions, and diplomatic residences. It spans Massachusetts Avenue N.W. between 18th and 35th street, bounded by Scott Circle to the south and the United States Naval Observatory to the north; the term is often applied to nearby streets and neighborhoods that also host diplomatic buildings, such as Kalorama.
Of the 182 diplomatic missions in the city, the majority are located on or near Embassy Row, including those of Italy, Australia, India, Greece, Egypt, Ireland, Japan, and the United Kingdom. Due to the large number of well-preserved Gilded Age estates and townhouses, many of which house diplomatic missions or dignitaries, Embassy Row has been protected as part of the Massachusetts Avenue Historic District. Its historic and multicultural character has also made the area a center of tourism and local cultural life.
The Hope Diamond and the Mansion Dog: The Embassy of Indonesia is housed in the Walsh-McLean Mansion. Its last private owner was the eccentric socialite Evalyn Walsh McLean, the final private owner of the supposedly cursed Hope Diamond. She famously hosted wild Gilded Age parties in the home, occasionally hiding the diamond in the cushions for guests to find, or fastening the priceless gem to the collar of her pet dog, a Great Dane, who would roam the mansion hallways. History Considered Washington's premier residential address in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Massachusetts Avenue became known for its numerous mansions housing the city's social and political elites. Consequently, the segment between Scott Circle and Sheridan Circle gained the nickname "Millionaires' Row".
The Great Depression of 1929 led many to sell their homes; the often illustrious and expansive estates were well-suited for housing diplomatic missions as well as lodges of social clubs, giving Embassy Row its present name and identity. The relocation to Embassy Row of diplomatic representations, many of which had been established in Meridian Hill in previous decades, was further catalyzed by the construction of the British Embassy, commissioned in 1925 and completed in 1930, and the Japanese Embassy, built in 1931. The greatest number of embassies and chanceries moved to Embassy Row and the neighboring Kalorama neighborhood in the 1940s and early 1950s.
On the southeastern section of the row, between Scott Circle and Dupont Circle, many individual houses and mansions were replaced by larger office or apartment buildings between the 1930s and the 1970s. More recently, several prominent think tanks have clustered in that area, which has occasionally been referred to as Think Tank Row.
Many of Embassy Row's diplomatic buildings open to the public once a year in May, an initiative nicknamed Passport DC. This event was started in 2007 by the embassies of member states of the European Union, and extended in 2008 to other countries around the world under coordination by Cultural Tourism DC. Within this program, the EU embassies still open on a separate day, labelled EU Open House. A separate program, the Embassy Series, started in 1994 and coordinates concerts organized in the embassy buildings.
Embassy Row is protected as the Massachusetts Avenue Historic District, created in 1974 following controversy about the demolition of historic townhouses on 1722-28 Massachusetts Ave NW. Many of its notable buildings are listed in the DC Inventory of Historic Sites. Because few historic buildings remain on Scott Circle, the eastern boundary of the Historic District was set on 17th Street NW, but, since three embassies are located there and none farther east, Scott Circle is included in this article's definition of Embassy Row. The Western boundary used here is identical to that of the Historic District, namely Observatory Circle. However, some (e.g. real estate professionals) describe Embassy Row as extending as far west as Wisconsin Avenue NW.
From Scott Circle to Sheridan Circle
This section of Massachusetts Avenue was the one known as the "Millionaires' Row" of Washington, D.C., in the late 19th and early 20th century.
North Side 1499 Massachusetts Ave NW: Post Massachusetts Avenue apartment building (arch. Esocoff & Associates, 2002) 1515 Massachusetts Ave NW: American Association for the Advancement of Science building (arch. Faulkner, Fryer and Vanderpool, 1956), now Embassy of Tunisia 1500 Rhode Island Ave NW: Brodhead-Bell-Morton Mansion, now the Embassy of Hungary (arch. John Fraser, 1879; remodeled by John Russell Pope, 1912) 1 Scott Circle NW: General Scott Apartments (arch. Robert O. Sholz, 1942) 1601 Massachusetts Ave NW: Embassy of Australia (arch. Bates, Smart & McCutcheon, 1965) 1617 Massachusetts Ave NW: Daniel C. Stapleton House (arch. Clarke Waggaman, 1917), now annex of the Embassy of the Philippines 1619 Massachusetts Ave NW: Forest Industries building (arch. Keyes, Lesbridge & Condon, 1961), now Benjamin T. Rome Building of Johns Hopkins University 1625 Massachusetts Ave NW: Airline Pilots Association building (arch. Vlastimil Koubek, 1972), now also Washington campus of Johns Hopkins Carey Business School 1701 Massachusetts Ave NW: The Bay State apartment building (arch. Robert O. Sholz, 1939) 1711 Massachusetts Ave NW: Boston House apartment building (arch. Berla & Abel, 1950) 1717 Massachusetts Ave NW: Bernstein-Offit building of Johns Hopkins University; the upper two floors used to host the embassy of the German Democratic Republic (arch. Cooper & Auerback, 1964) 1727 Massachusetts Ave NW: The Winthrop apartment building (arch. Alvin L. Aubinoe, 1940) 1775 Massachusetts Ave NW: Brookings Institution main building (arch. Faulkner, Kingsbury & Stenhouse, 1960) 1779 Massachusetts Ave NW: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (arch. Smith, Hinchman & Gryll, 1989), also hosting the Embassy of Papua New Guinea 1789 Massachusetts Ave NW (numbered 1785 until 2016): McCormick Apartments (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1917), now American Enterprise Institute 1801 Massachusetts Ave NW: Herbert Wadsworth House (arch. George Cary, 1902), now the Sulgrave Club 15 Dupont Circle NW: Robert W. Patterson House (arch. Stanford White, 1902), now Ampeer Dupont Circle apartments 11 Dupont Circle NW: office building (1974), home of the Peterson Institute for International Economics until 2001 1500 New Hampshire Ave NW: Dupont Circle Hotel (1950) 1501 Connecticut Ave NW: commercial building (1923), now Starbucks Coffee 1913 Massachusetts Ave NW: Dupont Circle Branch of the Riggs National Bank (arch. George Nicholas Ray, 1923), now PNC 2001 Massachusetts Ave NW: apartment house (arch. Gertrude Sawyer, 1935), now Kossuth House of the Hungarian Reformed Federation of America (1935) 2007 Massachusetts Ave NW: Horace A. Taylor House (arch. George Oakley Totten Jr., 1901) 2009 Massachusetts Ave NW: Hershell Main House, later Alice Roosevelt Longworth house (built 1881, front rebuilt 1910), now the Washington Legal Foundation 2015 Massachusetts Ave NW: Embassy Row Hotel, rebranded The Ven Embassy Row in late 2020 (arch. Fischer and Elmore, 1971) 2025 Massachusetts Ave NW: Samuel M. Bryan House (arch. W. Bruce Gray, 1885), now the Urban Alliance Foundation 2027 Massachusetts Ave NW: House (1911), now the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism 1600 21st Street NW: D. Clinch Phillips House (arch. Hornblower & Marshall, 1897), now the Phillips Collection 2107 Massachusetts Ave NW: T. Morris Murray House (1901), now Embassy of India 2121 Massachusetts Ave NW: Richard T. Townsend House (arch. Carrère and Hastings, 1901), now the Cosmos Club 2131 Massachusetts Ave NW: George W. Barrie House (arch. Marsh & Peter, 1905), now Embassy of Estonia 2201 Massachusetts Ave NW: Frederick A. Miller House (arch. Paul J. Pelz, 1901) 2203 Massachusetts Ave NW: Emeline D. Lovett House (arch. Alexander Millar, 1890) 2205 Massachusetts Ave NW: Anna Jenness-Miller House (arch. Waddy Wood, 1920), now the National Society Daughters of the American Colonists 2207 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. Louis D. Meline, 1902), now Embassy of Turkmenistan 2209 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. Wyeth & Cresson, 1911), now Embassy of Paraguay 2211 Massachusetts Ave NW: Irene Rucker Sheridan House (arch. Wood, Donn & Deming, 1904) 2217 Massachusetts Ave NW: Embassy of Greece (arch. Angelos Demetriou, 2006) 2221 Massachusetts Ave NW: Hennen Jennings House (arch. George Oakley Totten Jr., 1906), now residence of the Ambassador of Greece
South Side 1500 Massachusetts Ave NW: 1500 Massachusetts apartment building (1952) 1616 Rhode Island Ave NW: Center for Strategic and International Studies (arch. Hickok Cole, 2013) 1600 Massachusetts Ave NW: Embassy of the Philippines (1993) 1700 Massachusetts Ave NW: Emily J. Wilkins House (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1909), now Embassy of Peru 1708 Massachusetts Ave NW: Henry C. Nevins House (arch. Harvey L. Page, 1891), now Embassy of Trinidad and Tobago 1720 Massachusetts Ave NW: town house, now Stephanie Tubbs Jones building of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation 1724 Massachusetts Ave NW: Embassy of Colombia (1981) 1732 Massachusetts Ave NW: J.C. McGuire House (arch. Glenn Brown, 1889), now Embassy of Chile 1736 Massachusetts Ave NW: now Consular section of the Embassy of Chile 1740 Massachusetts Ave NW: Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (1962) 1746 Massachusetts Ave NW: Clarence Moore House (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1909), now Embassy of Uzbekistan 1750 Massachusetts Ave NW: Peterson Institute for International Economics (arch. James von Klemperer for Kohn Pedersen Fox, 2001) 1776 Massachusetts Ave NW: office building (1969) 1780 Massachusetts Ave NW: Ingalls House (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1912), now office of the President of the Brookings Institution 1800 Massachusetts Ave NW: office building (1979), now the Service Employees International Union 1369 Connecticut Ave NW: U.S. Trust Company building (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1912), now SunTrust branch 1350 Connecticut Ave NW: Dupont Circle Building (arch. Mihran Mesrobian, 1931) 21 Dupont Circle NW: Euram Building (arch. Hartman-Cox, 1972) 1 Dupont Circle NW: office building (arch. Vlastimil Koubek, 1968), now the American Council on Education 2000 P Street NW: The Toronto apartment building (arch. Albert H. Beers, 1908) 2000 Massachusetts Ave NW: James G. Blaine Mansion (arch. George Fraser, 1881), now Phillips & Cohen LLP 2012 Massachusetts Ave NW: Joseph Beale House (arch. Glenn Brown, 1897), now Embassy of Portugal 2020 Massachusetts Ave NW: Walsh-McLean House (arch. Henry Andersen, 1903), now Embassy of Indonesia 2100 Massachusetts Ave NW: Fairfax Hotel (arch. B. Stanley Simmons, 1927) 2118 Massachusetts Ave NW: Larz Anderson House (arch. Arthur Little & Herbert W. C. Browne, 1905), now Society of the Cincinnati 2122 Massachusetts Ave NW: State House apartment building (arch. Matthew G. Lepley, 1951) 2200 Massachusetts Ave NW: Alexander Stewart House (arch. Jules Henri de Sibour, 1909), now Embassy of Luxembourg 2202 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (1914), now office of the Defense Attaché of the Embassy of Turkey 2208 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. Louis D. Meline, 1900), now Embassy of Togo 2210 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. Louis D. Meline, 1901), now Embassy of Sudan 2212 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. Louis D. Meline, 1898) 2214-16 Massachusetts Ave NW: twin townhouses (arch. George Nicholas Ray, 1931) 2220 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. George Nicholas Ray, 1914), now Embassy of the Bahamas 2228 Massachusetts Ave NW: townhouse (arch. George Oakley Totten Jr. & Laussat Roger, 1903), now office of the Defense and Military Attaché of the Embassy of Greece