Bryan Voltaggio’s Range, newly opened in Friendship Heights, may be the hottest restaurant in town at the moment. Now its next door neighbor, which will feature food by Voltaggio, is about to go up in smoke.
Civil Cigar Lounge opens for business tonight in the Chevy Chase Pavilion, the new shopping center just across the street from the Mazza Gallerie in Friendship Heights. It joins two other cigar bars—downtown’s Shelly’s Back Room and Ozio—and a smattering of hookah bars as only bars and restaurants where it remains legal to light up in D.C.
Opened by the team behind W. Curtis Draper, a local tobacconist with shops in downtown D.C. and Bethesda, the lounge features a retail store and a 93-seat lounge to light up in. Stogies, which can be bought in the store and smoked in the lounge, run from $5.25 to about $30. (The tobacco prices aren’t inflated for the privilege of smoking onsite).
The ambiance is more modern than mahogany. Red leather banquettes are arranged around oversized ashtrays. Glass walls that carve out two private rooms between the retail shop and the lounge area give an open feel to the space. A long bar with narrow shelves filled with a large selection of scotches, whiskies, cognacs and glassware behind it looks a lot like the bar at Range. (The build-out of the two spaces was done together by the same design companies.) Sophistication fills the air, though you won’t find much too of a smoky haze—air is filtered and completely replaced every two minutes. Lighting and an absence of windows may make you feel more tucked into a suburban casino than right off the intersection of Wisconsin and Western Avenues NW.
And there’s the food. The Frederick, Md.-based restaurateur and Top Chef alumnus Bryan Voltaggio is behind the menu at Civil. All plates will all be fired from the neighboring Range’s kitchens, though the offerings will for the most part be unique to the cigar bar. A media preview event last week featured platters from Range’s salumeria, including wood-oven pizzas, ham sandwiches on cheddar and chive biscuits, as well truffles, barks, and biscotti to pair with the La Palina cigars and Manhattans.
Civil Cigar Loungeis at 5335 Wisconsin Avenue NW; (202)-364-0800.
