Lilly chose Goochland County from hundreds of applications based on several criteria, including workforce potential in the Richmond area, local incentives, ready access to utilities, transportation and favorable zoning. Lilly is receiving job creation support through the Virginia Talent Accelerator Program, created by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership, in collaboration with higher education partners.

Any financial support from the state was not disclosed.

The facility, the first of four new facilities it will announce in the U.S. this year, will be its first dedicated, fully integrated active pharmaceutical ingredient and drug product facility for its emerging bioconjugate platform and monoclonal antibody portfolio.

At the Richmond-area site, it will also boost its domestic manufacturing of antibody-drug conjugates, or ADCs, a targeted therapy designed to deliver potent medicines directly to diseased cells. They act like highly-specialized carriers, maximizing treatment effectiveness while reducing harm to healthy tissue.

ADCs are currently primarily used to treat cancer but are being explored for autoimmune diseases and other conditions.

Lilly said it expects that for every dollar invested in the Virginia facility, up to four dollars will be generated in local economic activity, and each manufacturing job will support multiple positions in related industries, such as supply chain, logistics and retail.

Lilly will also engage locally, partnering with area universities and supporting community education initiatives in Virginia.

Lilly will announce its three other new U.S. facilities before the end of this year, and expects to begin making medicines at them within five years.

Eli Lilly announced in February it would spend at least $27 billion to build new U.S. manufacturing plants, adding to $23 billion previous investments since 2020. It is among drugmakers moving to boost U.S. production on President Donald Trump’s warning to clamp down on pharmaceutical imports with steep tariffs.

Source

Realm Rooftop Bar & Lounge is at the hotel, which is located at 899 O Street, NW, and it straddles the Shaw neighborhood and D.C.’s convention center.

Realm is as much an indoor lounge and restaurant as it is outdoor, with a large patio and fire pits. Hotel general manager Donte Johnson said it has been designed to create a one-of-a-kind atmosphere with a “sophisticated yet relaxed vibe” unlike anything in the city.

The menu may be one of the things that distinguishes it. menu blends French cuisine with flavors of the Indian Ocean. The menu refers to the Seychelles, the chain of islands in the Indian Ocean off East Africa, once a French territory in the 1700s before Great Britain took possession in the early 1800s.

The Seychelles became an independent nation in the 1970s, but retains English, French and Seychellois Creole as the official languages

Small plates include flavors like coconut, tamarind, citrus and curry leaf, with dishes that include oysters with coconut-lime-ginger mignonette, tamarin-gazed lamb chops, Wagyu sliders with mango chutney, coconut crab cakes and ginger-lemongrass chicken skewers.

Hyatt House is run by Donohoe Hospitality. The Realm Rooftop Bar & Lounge is open to hotel guests, business and locals.

Source

Last year was a strong year for tourism spending in Virginia, with a total of $35.1 billion spent by 114.5 million visitors, up 5.4% from 2023, on the economic impact of visitors to Virginia in 2024 revealed. Overnight visitation to Virginia rose by more than 1 million to 44.7 million, surpassing pre-pandemic levels and setting a new record.

Loudoun County retains the title of most visitor spending, largely because of Dulles International Airport. The tourism spending numbers include transportation spending. That does not include prices paid for airfare by visitors, but does include landing and other fees paid by airlines, as well as roundtrip transportation costs for out-of-town visitors to and from the airport.

Overall tourist spending in Loudoun County totaled $4.9 billion in 2024, up 9% from 2023, with $2.9 billion of that coming from transportation, the report states.

Visit Loudoun President and CEO Beth Erickson also pointed to gains in other categories.

“For the past several years, Loudoun has seen an increase in visitor spending, which is a testament not only to the growth happening at Washington Dulles, but to the creativity and innovation of our tourism partners, who deliver world-class experiences and welcome every guest with genuine hospitality,”  Erickson said.

“From our craft beverage and elevated dining scene to new lodging properties and vibrant arts and music offerings, Loudoun continues to evolve as a dynamic destination.”

Loudoun County’s wine industry also marked 40 years last year. The county also led Virginia and the D.C. metro area for hotel occupancy.

Throughout Virginia, tourism spending was led by transportation, followed by food and beverage, lodging, recreation and retail.

Tourism Economics estimates the total economic impact for visitors to the Commonwealth was $53.3 billion, which generated $3.3 billion in state and local taxes. Tourism supported more than 328,000 jobs in Virginia last year.

Source

is the larger of the two buildings, with 577 apartment units and rent topping out at around $7,000 a month. That is less than the highest-priced penthouses at the first building, the Aerie, that top out at $13,000 a month, but does not skimp on amenities.

Facilities include a rooftop pool with 360-degree views, cabana lounges, a pet spa and game room, a fitness center with a climbing wall, lap pool and sauna, and more than 117,000 square feet of outdoor amenity space it shares with the Aerie.

Both buildings are fixed around a regulation football field-sized park that includes an outdoor pool, fire pits, lounges and grill stations, lawn games, a dog park and a children’s playground.

The Zephyr’s apartments have floor-to-ceiling windows and high-end kitchens.

Combined, the two buildings have almost 900 apartments. While both are among the most expensive apartments to hit the D.C. market this year, both buildings are offering renters who qualify for a lease up to two months of free rent.

Both the Aerie and Zephyr were designed by D.C.-based architect Shalom Bones Associates, whose other projects include the Georgetown Ritz-Carlton, The Yards, the renovation of the Pentagon and several Rosslyn high-rises.

The Wardman Park renovation is yearslong in the making by San Francisco developer , which bought the former Wardman Park Hotel in 2021. In all, the development covers 9.5 acres, with a main entrance at 2650 Woodley Road.

The Pacific Life Insurance Co.’s Wardman Hotel Owner LLC filed for bankruptcy in 2021 after lengthy courtroom battles that included Marriott International, the operator of the hotel for decades.

The hotel closed in 2020, shortly after the onset of the pandemic. Carmel Partners, which ultimately purchased the entire property, began its redevelopment in 2024.

Source

For August, MGM National Harbor patrons made $70.1 million in bets, the largest share of the state’s six casinos, but the total was down 6.5% from August of last year. Gaming revenue was up 2.1% at Live! Casino and Hotel, to $63.2 million, and up 4.4% at Horseshoe Casino in Baltimore, to $15.1 million.

Among the state’s three smaller casinos, Ocean Downs and Rocky Gap posted year-over-year gaming revenue gains. Gaming revenue was down at Hollywood Casino.

The state collected $72.8 million from its share of gaming revenue in August, down 2.1% from a year ago. Of that total, $52.4 million went to Maryland’s Education Trust Fund, with the balance going to other state-funded programs.

August marked the second month in the state’s new fiscal year.

For fiscal year 2025, the state’s six casinos generated just shy of $2 billion, the third-best single year in the 15-year history of legalized casino gambling in the state. Casinos contributed $831.3 million to the state, most of which went to the Education Trust Fund.

Maryland Lottery and Gaming has published a full breakdown of , as well as totals for legalized gambling revenue for fiscal 2025, .

Maryland lottery had its fourth-best year in its 52-year history for FY 2025. Scratch-off ticket sales surpassed $1 billion for the fourth consecutive year.

Source

Desert 5 Spot is named after the desert five-spot flowering plant native to the Southwest U.S. and Mojave Desert.

The D.C. location, at 400 Morse Street, NE, opened Sept. 5, and spans both levels of the warehouse, which was previously home to combination art gallery and restaurant Palette 22.

The Union Market location, operated by , is all country and western vibe, with a mechanical bull, a vintage Chevy truck that serves as the DJ booth, desert-inspired interior, a rooftop cactus garden terrace, and plenty of retro neon signs.

There is live music nightly, as well as line dancing classes Ten Five Hospitality promises some of the D.C. region’s top musicians.

There are two live music stages, and a menu that includes Nashville Hot Chicken, smoked pork spareribs, brisket sandwiches and cast iron cornbread.

“Desert 5 Spot has always been about great live country music, strong drinks, and zero pretense — just a place where friends can meet and have a good time,” said Dan Daley, managing partner at Ten Five Hospitality. “We’re excited to bring D5 to D.C., a city with a vibrant dining and nightlife scene, and to add something fresh and unique to the mix.”

Cowboy boots aren’t required, but the dress code encourages a country and western look.

“We kindly ask y’all to abide by the country dress code. Cowboys don’t wear athletic shorts, athletic tops, sweatpants or flip-flops. It’s boot country around here,” a dress code on Desert 5 Spot’s website reads.

Desert 5 Spot is open Wednesdays through Sundays. The venue is also available for private parties or events bookings.

Source

Meal kits that have proliferated since skyrocketing to popularity after the pandemic are designed, in part, to fill that gap. But, a CNET editor said they have several shortcomings.

The churn rate is high for many meal kit delivery companies, with as high as 50% of customers canceling their subscription after a few months.

“When we start thinking about subscriptions, for a lot of people, that’s another bill. Let’s say you’re not happy with the meals. Let’s say that you don’t want as many from week to week, of course you can cancel, but those can come with restrictions,” said Dashia Milden, consumer insights editor at CNET.

HelloFresh, she said, has the model right. It does not charge a subscription, but lets customers place orders for however many meals they want on a weekly basis, and charges for delivery.

With those prices and often delivery commitments, introducing meal kits into your household requires some math.

“I would not say get a meal kit for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I would say think about the times that you think that you really need to have a meal handy, and see what that math looks like. Is it cheaper than DoorDash or Uber Eats? Is it more of a time saver than other things that you are doing?” Milden said.

She said another area for improvement is customization and flexibility. Menus can become repetitive, and more companies should provide choices based on individual nutritional and dietary needs.

Meal kits may not always be as easy to prepare and as healthy as they look either.

“What we’re cooking and how we’re cooking it. Even just the temperatures in mind is another thing. Overcooking or undercooking is another. If you are looking into a meal kit, my recommendation is to treat it just like you would if you were creating a meal from scratch or going to the grocery store. Really looking at that sodium intake and some of those nutritional facts.”

The meal kit business is fragmented.

CNET said HelloFresh is the sales leader in the U.S., but that it only accounts for about 10% of total sales. Despite room for improvement, meal delivery kits remain a consumer force.

Sales in the U.S. are expected to top $6 billion in 2025.

Source

The Heights took over space formerly occupied by PF Chang’s restaurant, including a total of 10,000-square-feet with outdoor dining and a variety of food styles. Among the original tenants: both Michelin-starred chefs and a James Beard Award nominee.

At its peak, the half-dozen food stalls also induced full-service restaurant Urbano and full-service Bar, The Heights Bar.

The Heights’ last day, at 5400 Wisconsin Avenue, was Sunday, Aug. 24.

“After many wonderful memories, The Heights Food Hall will be permanently closing our doors. This space was built for gathering, sharing food and creating moment together — and that is exactly what you all made it. We’ll carry those memories with us,” Food Heights posted on social media.

Common Place Hospitality, the restaurant group behind Urbano, launched the food hall after it underwent months of delays in December 2023.

Source

The important measure is year-over-year, and on that account, the D.C. area market is holding up.

Redfin reported year-over-year median selling prices were down in 29 of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in July, the highest tally dating back to the company’s 2012 records. But, the median selling price of a home that sold in the D.C. metropolitan area remained higher than a year ago.

“In Washington, D.C., home values are down 0.56% month-over month, but they are up 2.65% year-over-year, a reflection of where we were at last year. At this point, prices are falling, but they’re falling very slowly,” said Redfin chief economist Daryl Fairweather.

At that pace, it would take a long time for most existing homeowners to actually lose money on their sale. In the D.C. region, just 2% of current owners are underwater, or owing their lender more than they could sell their property for. But 35% are considered equity rich, able to sell for at least 50% more than they paid, according to Attom Data.

However, some sellers in the D.C. region are still coming out of the gate with list prices that may not be the ultimate selling price.

“Listing prices are higher than what homes are actually selling for, but listing prices have been coming down since May of this year. It seems like more sellers are starting to accept reality,” said Fairweather, who attributes that to more sellers listing to their agents up front.

“Real estate agents, when they’re doing their jobs correctly, are showing their sellers what the comps are, they show them how quickly homes are selling. They show them what homes are priced appropriately and how they compare to homes that are overpriced and are lingering on the market. That is definitely an important job of real estate agents, and it seems to be getting through in Washington, D.C.,” she said.

About one in 10 listings that sold in the D.C. area this spring had the original listing price reduced, according to listing service Bright MLS.

Source

Bao Bei is opening the 1,900-square-foot restaurant on Aug. 27 at , next to Kosmo Nail Bar.

Bao Bei is “a term of endearment in Taiwanese, describes someone or something you treasure deeply,” chef Kevin Hsieh said.

“Our ghost kitchen is just a mile down the road from our new brick-and-mortar location, so it made sense to stay close to the community we first built Bao Bei.

Hsieh is a Montgomery County native and 2013 graduate of Gaithersburg High School.

Bao Bei serves traditional bao sandwiches and steamed dumplings, as well as bowls and sweet treats, such as swirly buns and almond tofu.

Hsieh and his team finished in second place on Season 17 of the “Great Food Truck Race,” losing out to Wally’s Waffles in the final episode.

Source

Charlotte, North Carolina-based Truist said over the next five years, it will open 100 new branches, and renovate more than 300 existing branches, in D.C., as well as Atlanta, Charlotte, Austin, Dallas, Miami, Orlando and Philadelphia. It did not break out the total number of new or renovated branches in each market.

The expansion will include a broadened focus on retail wealth investor clients.

“This significant investment demonstrates Truist’s continued commitment to grow with our clients at every step of their financial journeys and to strengthen market share in some of the most dynamic areas in the country,” said Chairman and CEO Bill Rogers.

The bank did not say how much it is investing in expansion, but said it will include hiring more financial advisers and enhancing digital banking tools.

Truist was formed by the 2019 merger of two Charlotte-based banking giants, BB&T and SunTrust. In the D.C. market, it currently has about 170 branches. It ranks No. 3 here, behind Capital One Financial and Bank of America.

The local expansion comes at the same time both Chase Bank and Bank of America plot larger footprints through retail expansion in the D.C. region. Nationally, Truist is now the 9th-largest bank by customer deposits. It has total assets of $544 billion.

Source

Beer comes in kegs, but wine?

Sixty Vines says wine tapped from kegs is the closest to a “from the barrel” tasting experience outside of a winery, and the most sustainable way to serve so many wines in a given time.

Each keg holds the equivalent of 26 bottles of wine, and kegs are reused as many as 1,500 times over their refillable lifetime.

Sixty Vines serves wines by the half glass, glass, flights and, yes, the traditional bottle from winemakers around the world. Many are usually not available by the glass at other restaurants.

The dining room will be more than 9,000-square feet, along with a large outdoor patio.

The menus are focused on wine pairings. Diners can build their own charcuterie boards or hand-tossed pizzas. Entrées include Atlantic salmon, roasted chicken, a double cabernet burger and wood-grilled steaks. The staff can also suggest wines for pairings.

“Our menu is meant to be shared, with dishes that make it easy to discover new flavors and connect around the table. Sixty Vines is all about creating an experience that’s as much about the people you’re with as the food you enjoy together,” said Sixty Vines CEO Jeff Carcara.

The Downtown Crown location opens this fall, with no exact opening date announced. It will be open for weekend brunch, and lunch and dinner throughout the week.

Sixty Vines has two other D.C.-area locations. Its first opened in Foggy Bottom on Washington Circle, with another at Reston Town Center, where it replaced the former Clyde’s restaurant. It has other restaurants in Texas, North Carolina and Florida.

Source

Meyer’s Daily Provisions has 11 locations in New York City, New Jersey and Boston, one of nine restaurant concepts operates, including Union Square Cafe, The Modern and Grammercy Tavern. It will open a second Daily Provisions location in Boston next year.

Popular for breakfasts, Daily Provisions’ menu includes several versions of a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich. One of them — exclusive to the D.C. location — is a “Half Smoke” egg and cheese sandwich — a nod to the District favorite.

Working with purveyor in Landover, Maryland, it developed a coarsely-ground, and heavily-spiced sausage patty that’s like a half smoke, only not in sausage form.

Sandwiches throughout the day are all made-to-order. The menu includes fancy-sounding salads and roasted chicken with sides. The Dupont Cycle location will serve local beers, including Honor Brewing, Crooked Run Coast and Aslin. Daily Provisions also caters.

Breakfast sandwiches are $9.50 to $15. Lunch salads and sandwiches are $10 to $19. Dinner entrées are $14 to $22. The chicken dinner with sides is $45 and serves three.

There’s a bakery with sweets, including crullers — New York’s sweet little, curled cakes that are deep-fried and covered in cinnamon or maple — and cookies. The entire menu is available for dining indoors or outdoors on-site, or when ordering carry out through its own delivery platform.

The indoor dining room has a mix of tables, seating 54, and the Q Street outdoor patio seats 16. The Dupont Circle location is open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. at 1061 Connecticut Ave., a high-profile corner with lots of Metro traffic, a block from the Q Street Metro entrance.

Source

Sinclair’s offer of $25 to $30 a share would trump the $22 per share offer Tegna has now agreed to. The Nexstar deal would require both regulatory and shareholder approval.

Tegna said its board has unanimously approved the Nexstar acquisition.

The offer from Sinclair was not mentioned in by Tegna and Nexstar confirming their agreement.

Long-standing rules that limit the number of TV stations any one company can own are in flux, and regulatory changes could lift some of those banks. The Federal Communications Commission has been reconsidering caps on stations.

Last month, an appeals court overturned a rule that currently limits companies from owning two of the four top stations in any market.

Source

But the metric that measures the median selling price of all properties being sold, including those in the upper 5% of price range, is defined as the luxury market. In the D.C. metro, that is homes priced at $1.8 million or more.

“The most active buyers in the market right now are higher-income buyers,” said Lisa Sturtevant, chief economist at listing service . “Because they are more active in the market, they are actually skewing that median sold price, making it look like the overall market is seeing price gains. But it is really about the middle of homes being sold.”

The luxury market has traditionally seen less competition from buyers, but Bright MLS noted a change in competition at the higher level starting in the second quarter of this year.

“The luxury market is still pretty competitive,” Sturtevant said. “Homes are selling more quickly than other homes in the overall market. And, as always, luxury sales are more likely to be cash sales. So right now, the luxury market is slowing, but it is still more resilient than the overall market.”

The annual median selling price gain in the overall D.C.-area market in the second quarter was 2.0%, compared to 2.3% in the luxury market.

Luxury buyers also need to ask quickly. The median days on market for those listings in the second quarter was just 11 days, with 25.1% of sales closing above list price.

The luxury market also appears to be more isolated from federal government spending and job cuts in the D.C. region than the overall market, though Sturtevant said that may change.

“The threshold for the luxury market is $1.8 million,” she said. “That is an expensive home. But it is also a home that people who work in the federal government could potentially afford to purchase. We are going to see more impact on the housing market from the federal government cuts this fall, and I think that could rise up into the luxury segment of the market.”

The definition of the luxury market may also need rethinking. Those entry-level luxury market prices no longer necessarily represent only wealthy buyers who may have no concern about how local economic changes affect them.

“I think we are going to have to do a better job at differentiating between luxury — those $1.8 million and $2 million homes that include a lot of suburban, single-family homes. We need to distinguish that luxury market from the upper end,” Sturtevant said. “Because I think we are going to see a divergence in how those two markets perform this fall as the federal layoffs and cuts have more of an impact on our local housing market.”

The D.C. region dominates the luxury market in the mid-Atlantic region, which Bright MLS listings cover. Five of the top 10 luxury market ZIP codes in the mid-Atlantic are here, including Dupont Circle’s 20007 in D.C., where 42% of second quarter sales were defined as luxury. In McLean, Virginia’s 22101, 38% of sales were luxury. ZIP codes in Bethesda, Arlington and Potomac all saw an outside share of total sales fall in the luxury category in the second quarter.

ZIP code 20007 also ranked No. 2 in the mid-Atlantic for sales in the “ultra luxury market,” with 19% of sales priced in the top 1%, topped only by 24% in Princeton, New Jersey.

All-cash sales accounted for one-third of all luxury sales in the second quarter. In the mid-Atlantic, the top all-cash market was Maryland’s Eastern Shore, where more than half of luxury properties are purchased with cash.

The highest-priced sale in the D.C. region in the second quarter was a riverfront estate that sold for $14.05 million.

Source