The German Embassy bar is modeled on a bar in Berlin. Photograph by Ron Blunt.
Willkommen, Bienvenue
Soon after their arrival here a decade ago, then–German ambassador Wolfgang Friedrich Ischinger and wife Jutta Falke-Ischinger were horrified by the crypt-like entertaining space in their residence on DC’s Foxhall Road.
Falke-Ischinger commissioned a team to design a “Berlin Bar,” modeled after the famous Paris Bar in the German capital, known for its fin-de-siècle atmosphere. The basement room now sports rich red walls, black-and-white cubist decor, and a long convivial bar stocked with tankards and Pilsner glasses. On the walls are framed black-and-white photos of postwar Berlin, including the Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie.
This article appears in the February 2012 issue of The Washingtonian.
