Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
An uneasy union
Couples get cold feet about weddings at Trump’s D.C. hotel
Sarah Squire’s wedding wasn’t meant to be a political statement. But, she says, it probably seems like one now.
Back when Squire booked the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., for her January nuptials, Donald Trump was one of a dozen candidates clamoring for the Republican nomination. He was widely presumed to be a long shot for the nation’s highest office.
But by the time Squire and her husband wed in the property’s presidential ballroom on Jan. 14, Trump was six days away from being sworn in as president.
“That definitely wasn’t something we ever considered,” said Squire, 27, who works for a law firm in Nashville, Tenn. “We had no idea this would happen.”
The reasons Squire chose the historic property on Pennsylvania Avenue, she says, were simple: It was a historic building in downtown Washington that could easily accommodate her 300 invitees.
“And we heard that it was Ivanka behind the design — not her daddy,” added Squire’s mother, Elisabeth. “She has great taste.”
While a handful of couples have already tied the knot at Trump’s hotel since it opened in September, wedding planners say many others are eschewing the property in favor of less controversial venues.
Trump spent $212 million renovating the historic property, which he is renting from the General Services Administration.
A spokeswoman for the hotel did not respond to requests for comment.
“A lot of brides are saying ‘This is very political for my guests, so I think I’ll go elsewhere,’ ” said a local wedding planner who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the backlash following an October wedding she planned at the hotel.
“The fallout of this — people threatening my family, calling for boycotts of my company — has been worse than anything I could’ve imagined,” she added.
Even couples who have already gotten married at the hotel are treading carefully. One couple asked that their names not be visible in wedding photos shared online. Others have begun leaving the name “Trump” off invitations, referring to the property instead by its original name, “the Old Post Office Pavilion,” according to a local florist.
The reaction to the property “has been as split as the election was,” said Jennifer Stiebel, owner of Soco Events, who planned a New Year’s Eve wedding at the hotel. “Let’s put it this way: There are definitely some clients I would never recommend it to. But at the same time, when you walk into that lobby, it’s hard to deny that it is gorgeous.”
That refrain — gorgeous, beautiful, stunning — was a common one among the area’s wedding planners.
“It’s beautiful — there’s no way around that,” said Katie Martin, owner of Elegance & Simplicity, a Bethesda, Md., company that specializes in eco-friendly weddings.
But, she added, her clients have yet to show any interest.
“We’re such a divided nation right now,” Martin said. “Nobody wants their wedding to become a political event.”
The phenomenon, she says, isn’t limited to Trump’s hotel. Martin says her clients had similar reactions to the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center when it opened in 1998. Other couples, she said, refuse to consider the Whittemore House mansion in Dupont Circle because it is home to the Women’s National Democratic Club.
Some, though, say they’ve faced backlash over their decisions to do business at the Trump. Aaron Broadus, band leader of Broad Sound Entertainment, said other musicians questioned his intentions when he took to Facebook to write about his experience playing at the hotel.
“People started saying, ‘Oh, well I would never perform there,’ ” said Broadus, who is also a music professor at Georgetown University. “But that’s not where we stand. We’re impartial. And in the end, everything was OK.”
Tara Melvin isn’t convinced. As the owner of Perfect Planning Events, she oversees about 15 weddings a year but has no intention of planning any at the Trump.
“Honestly, I don’t ask my clients what their political views are, but I do know that integrity is important to a lot of them,” she said, adding that she was put off by some of Trump’s comments about women and people of different ethnic and religious groups.
“I would never go against a client’s wants or needs,” she added, “but this is one property I won’t voluntarily be recommending.”