Offbeat but upscale, the Hotel Rouge, where red-and more red-splashes throughout the building, sits on Embassy Row, steps away from downtown businesses and the city's funkiest stores, restaurants and the 1,800-acre Rock Creek Park in the trendy Dupont Circle. Visitors are just five blocks from the White House and two miles or less from other government buildings, National Zoo, museums, monuments and galleries synonymous with the Nation's Capital. Golfers are just short putts from Haines Point, the 18-hole public course overlooking the Potomac River. Air travelers are five miles and 27 miles respectively from Reagan National and Dulles International airports.

The Avant-garde and in vogue Bar Rouge's complimentary social hours offer guests red wine on weeknights, Bloody Marys and cold pizza on weekends, and such specialty drinks as the Brigitte Bardot Martinis. Patrons perch on white-leather stools, throne armchairs or long couches that keep the hip quotient high. Images of falling snow dance across a flat-screen monitor, while the sound system pumps out acid jazz. The Bar Rouge also tempts tastebuds with daily continental breakfasts and specialty dinners.

Guests also will enjoy the hotel's fitness and business centers. The Hotel Rouge's 132 guestrooms feature complimentary high-speed or pay-as-you-surf dial-up Internet access, video-game consoles, minibars stocked with red foods and drinks, fancy Aveda toiletries, oversized easy chairs and hassocks, velvet curtains, flat-screen TVs and zebra-print bathrobes. Specialty rooms are dedicated to online chatting, chilling with CDs, or enjoying food with food from microwave ovens and refrigerators.

What's more, "No Need to Beg" pet packages feature red fire-hydrant mats and feeding bowls, liver biscottis, and disposable bags for calling cards.

A member of the Kimpton boutique hotel company and dubbed Washington's rock-star hotel by locals, the Hotel Rouge, by design, is for guest that want an eclectic experience that they are destined not to forget.