Watergate Complex
- Architects
- Luigi Moretti Società Generale Immobiliare
- City
- Washington, DC
Built between 1963 and 1971 by architect Luigi Moretti with developer Società Generale Immobiliare, the Watergate is a ten-acre complex of six buildings in Foggy Bottom — cooperative apartments, a hotel, and an office building — just north of the Kennedy Center. It quickly became one of the most desirable addresses in Washington, popular with members of Congress and executive-branch appointees. Its name became permanently attached to the 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee's offices in the complex's office building, the scandal that forced President Nixon's resignation two years later.
the building
Curved massing. The complex is known for its distinctive curved massing, spread across six separate buildings on ten acres bounded by Virginia Avenue, New Hampshire Avenue, F Street, and the Potomac — a scale and shape unusual among Washington's residential and office developments of the 1960s.
the architect
The complex was designed by architect Luigi Moretti in partnership with the development firm Società Generale Immobiliare.
significance
The Watergate is a DC Historic Landmark and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Beyond its architecture, it gave the English language the suffix "-gate," now attached by journalists to political scandals well beyond Washington.
nearby
- John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
- Old Naval Observatory
- Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Hall
- Earley, John J., Office and Studio
- Mullett Rowhouses
- Engine Company No. 23 (Foggy Bottom Firehouse)