The village of Washington, Virginia is 228 years old. Over the last 46 of those years, it has become a sort of company town. The company in question is the Inn at Little Washington, chef/owner Patrick O’Connell’s luxurious restaurant and hotel.
The inn’s gastronomical prowess—it is the only area restaurant to garner three Michelin stars—is just part of the draw. Just as important is the place itself, which not only includes the main restaurant, but also Patty O’s tavern, a bakery, a shop, gardens, llamas, and opulent accommodations spread over multiple historic buildings. It’s all the more remarkable because when O’Connell bought the inn building in 1978, it was a humble mechanic’s shop.
O’Connell’s latest expansion plan would be one of the most significant to date—it’ll be the first time he has built major new structures in town from the ground up—and will include a spa, infinity pool, and several more overnight rooms, all hidden away from the street.
“I’ve always been fond of the monastic idea of a little courtyard creating a refuge from the world,” O’Connell said at a presentation on the Inn’s future this week.
First, he’ll unveil ten hotel rooms spread across a few new buildings, including the Cardinal’s House, on the site of what was a tiny historic cabin about a block from the main restaurant. Project and design coordinator Alicia Fatula says these rooms will debut in July.
Eventually, the inn will break ground on the larger expansion, transforming the empty space on the block behind the original inn building with a new carriage house-like hotel building, the full-service spa and pool, and an underground wine cellar served by elevator. The restaurant will remain unchanged, and O’Connell believes his roughly 250 current staff members will be able to handle the additions.
The style of the new structures will mimic the existing ones, drawing on Virginia architectural traditions while making them even more baroque and exuberant. The design approach was inspired by O’Connell’s longtime collaborator, the London-based designer Joyce Conwy Evans, now in her 90s, and will be executed by architect Michael Franck.
“The whole thing, if you drive by, you won’t see anything,” O’Connell said. “It will just look as if it’s always been there.”
It’s unclear when the expansion, which has cleared an architectural review, will be finished, but O’Connell doesn’t seem too worried about it. To him, the inn is a Winchester Mystery House that’s never finished, or, to use his own metaphor, an ever-expanding canvas.
“[Franck has] said various things: ‘by Friday,’ and then he’s said ‘14 years,’” O’Connell joked on Tuesday. “So, one never knows. It’ll be finished when it’s finished.”
