Glen Echo Park

Dancing in the Park

Glen Echo Park’s historic Spanish Ballroom invites you to learn a few new steps.

Photograph by Sora DeVore

When its doors first opened in 1933, people flocked to the Spanish Ballroom at Glen Echo Park, and it has been a fixture for generations since. This magnificent Mediterranean-style building of stucco, concrete, and steel boasts 7,500 square feet of dance floor that can accommodate up to 1,800 dancers at once.

Named on the National Register of Historic Places, the Spanish Ballroom is beautiful to behold, but it is more than just a sight to see. In its heyday, the hall was one of the East Coast’s premier dance venues. Throughout its first three decades, many great bands played to a dance floor so packed that barely a spot of wood could be seen. The vast building has always had fantastic acoustics, but the floor is its crowning achievement. The springy maple floor, built suspended on beams rather than flat on the foundation, gives dancers so much cushion that they can dance for hours without the smallest fear of a sore pair of knees or a tight back.

After enduring decades of wear and tear from hundreds of fabulous dance parties, the Spanish Ballroom was restored to its full majesty in 2003. The place underwent a careful reconstruction of the art deco and Spanish interior of the original building. The Egyptian touches that graced the original are also present, recalling a stylistic trend of the late 1920s that followed the discovery of King Tut’s tomb. In fact, every effort was made to keep things just as they were when the structure was first built. Although almost every surface needed heavy work to restore the image and feel of the original, especially the outer walls, one piece was left untouched. That dance floor, after carrying dancers for more than 70 years, survives intact to be experienced in this era.

Today, the Spanish Ballroom is enjoying something of a renaissance. Dance classes are held regularly for a number of styles, including waltz, swing, contra, salsa, and more. The room is also available for private events, such as wedding receptions, dance parties, school events, bar/bat mitzvahs, or even corporate gatherings.

If you have any desire to move your feet in rhythm to song, there’s no better place. Do yourself a favor and save a dance for the Spanish Ballroom.

–John Frye

Editor’s Note: For a schedule of dance classes and other related information, call 301-634-2222 or visit glenechopark.org/dancing.htm.