• Significance: The building was described in 1919 as the "first hotel apartment of its size built for the exclusive use of colored people in this country." (Washington Bee, July 19, 1919) It was built at a cost of over $100,000,in the flush of World War prosperity.

The originator of the hotel was John W. Lewis, the founder of the Industrial Savings Bank on U Street (which was the predecessor of the present Industrial Bank), and according to the Bee August 17, 1919) "the first colored financier that has ever been a success in Washington." Lewis organized a stock company, the Whitelaw Apartment House Company, to raise the necessary money. He stressed that he wanted blacks, not whites to invest , "so when this prosperity... passes, they can see buildings towering skyward and say to the world 'this is what we have gotten out of prosperity'" (Bee, October 5, 1918).

The hotel filled a need at a time of segregation when there was "not a hotel in Washington to accommodate our friends when they come to the city form other parts of the country" (Bee, October 5, 1918).

• Survey number: HABS DC-363
• Building/structure dates: 1918 Initial Construction
• Building/structure dates: 1979 Subsequent Work