Finding Forest

For Tuesday night's Washington launch of Zubrówka vodka at the new Marriott Wardman Park lobby bar, wild bunches of tall grass and short tamed hedges covered the 4,500-square-foot, 175-seat space, which opened in late April. For Richard Roberts—vice president and director of export at the Polish spirit’s company, Central European Distribution Corporation—the setting was all about telling a story.

“Most vodkas today were just created and don’t have a real history,” said Roberts, adding that Zubrówka’s flavor—now centuries old—stems from the grass growing in Poland’s protected Bialowieza Forest. Each bottle of the green-tinted vodka carries a single blade of grass.In choosing a venue for the second official U.S. launch event (the first was in Chicago in January), Roberts knew that the hotel's bar was a given. “It was natural, since [the hotel’s general manager] Ed [Rudzinski] used to run the Marriott in Poland, and is involved in the National Polish Center,” he said.

The Marriott provided Polish-appropriate eats, including passed potato pierogis and kielbasa and an ice display with caviars, while Encore Decor laid out the grass displays against the walls, and on top of the the tables and the 40-foot-long bar. The 140 guests—including a handful of industry insiders, who were scoping out the space—took home their own bottle of Zubrówka as well as a small bunch of the precious grass in an oversize matchstick box as mementos.