The residence, here in mid-summer splendor, sits on five lush acres of gardens that border Rock Creek Park with trees, flowers, birds and a swimming pool. On July 14th every year, the French community is invited to celebrate Bastille Day.
“People would always tell me that this house is so French,” muses François Bujon de l’Etang, who served as Ambassador from 1995 to 2001. “The irony is that, with its neo Tudor design, it is anything but French.” But, he adds, “What makes it French is the art de vivre.”
The residence, whose breathtaking interiors evoke various periods of French design, from the grand siècle of Louis XIV to the Empire of Napoléon, and whose masterpiece is the red grand salon with its Bonnard painting, has always been the site of some of the capital’s greatest social and intellectual gatherings. Even at the height of the Iraq crisis that replaced French fries with “freedom fries” in the Congressional lexicon, one could spot an amusing mix of Francophiles, and even an occasional neoconservative, sharing sumptuous meals and exquisite wines in the beautiful boiserie dining room.
