In a truly D.C. move, the District’s downtown will soon be home to the only progressive, social justice-focused hospitality brand inspired by the Beat Generation and Vietnam War protesters in the U.S.
Called Eaton Workshop, the center aims to be a hub for journalists, pioneers and changemakers when it opens in spring 2018, as the company puts it in their opening announcement. It includes four main offerings: a hotel, a co-working space, a wellness center and a media arm, offering live events and a digital content platform.
Eaton Workshop is a portfolio member of Hong Kong-based Great Eagle Holdings, and the company has plans to open a location in China city later in 2018. Founder and president Katherine Lo, the daughter of Hong Kong-based billionaire Lo Ka-shui who chairs Great Eagle, clearly channels her interests and experiences in activism, anthropology and film into the company. Eaton Workshop also plans to open in San Francisco and Seattle, as well.
Eaton D.C. will have 209 hotel rooms, a radio station, 50-person cinema, a wellness center offering yoga, meditation and the works, a coffee shop and juice bar, a restaurant and bar, a rooftop bar, a speakeasy, an event space for up to 182 people, rotating art exhibits and a co-working "club" that can have up to 370 members.
"Recent political events make our first hotel in D.C. that much more trenchant," Lo said in the press release. "The Eaton that we are creating will be a safe space and sanctuary for all: international, people of color, LGBTQ, and more."
With all of the working pieces and goals, it's hard to keep track of what exactly Eaton plans to offer at launch. (Did we also mention the artist-in-residency programs and film festivals they have cooking up?)
Here's how it breaks down: Eaton Hotel plans to appeal to "those who travel seeking inspiration, innovation and impact." Guests will be offered a range of content and programming, social and creative incubators and a range of food options.
Eaton House, the group's co-working club, has private, shared and communal workspaces available in each hotel. Members can access the hotel's amenities and the house's networking series and other events. They plan to attract social justice-minded creatives.
The wellness center will be inspired by new age practices, like yoga and meditation, acupuncture and other alternative therapies and infrared saunas and sound baths. Eaton also plans to offer what it's calling "vegetable forward and detox food and beverage offerings" to its guests.
Lastly, the media arm will also cover a vast number of different offerings. Eaton plans to host live events and distinct programming for their guests, such as fireside chats, while also engaging with them through a radio station, the in-house cinema, artist residency studios, recording studios, music speakeasies, speaker auditoriums, original commissioned artwork and more. Eaton Workshop also plans to curate and distribute its own digital content, focused on immigration, women's rights, race in the U.S., climate change, food waste, health care and more.
It's unclear where in downtown the new hotel will be popping up in or what the hotel or co-working rates look like. Bloomberg reports that the rates will be somewhere in the low $200s per night for the hotel.
"Each step in realizing Eaton stems from my goal of cultivating the ultimate utopian gathering place for global innovators and creatives who seek to change the world," Lo said in the same statement. "This brand is the manifestation of me ‘following my bliss,’ so others can follow theirs."
