WASHINGTON, D.C. — James Beard Award-winning chef Mashama Bailey is expanding from Savannah into Washington with two Southern concepts inside the JW Marriott on Pennsylvania Avenue, working with partner Johno Morisano and Danny Meyer’s Union Square Events.
The first room, Diner Bar by The Grey, is aimed at a December launch and will take over the former 1331 Bar and Lounge. A second, more formal dining room called The Grey on Penn is slated for spring. Hotel ownership is folding the new kitchens into a broader multi-million-dollar property upgrade.
Bailey wants an all-day cadence: breakfast through dinner, then late snacks at the bar. Guests may still find Savannah staples such as fried red rice balls and fish and grits, but she says most plates will be built for the District, from a barbecued salmon biscuit at breakfast to a Miss America fried-bologna sandwich and a burger finished with comeback sauce.
According to a separate industry report, the first space will hold roughly 100 seats at 1331 Pennsylvania Avenue NW and open before year-end. Design plans lean on deep blues, brass and Art Deco lines that echo The Grey’s Savannah roots, bright by day and darker when the bar takes over at night.
Bailey and Morisano once pursued a Union Market site and already run a Paris restaurant alongside their Savannah flagship. Bailey has described the capital as a cultural crossroads that fits Southern cooking that keeps moving with the people who cook and eat it.
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