RICHMOND, Va. — Over the river and through the woods to Grandma's house won't do for Mom or, for that matter, Grandma on Mother's Day. A proper celebration includes going out for brunch or lunch, along with a spouse, son or daughter to pay the tab.
That's why the century-old Jefferson Hotel on the fringe of Richmond's downtown will feed more than 750 people this coming Mother's Day in its soaring Rotunda and adjacent rooms and balconies. More than 300 others were on a waiting list in April, hoping for cancellations.
Many will come from out of town for the grand event, even some who make an annual pilgrimage.
"Many Richmonders and repeat hotel guests have made celebrating holidays at The Jefferson a real tradition," says Pat Manning, the hotel's assistant manager.
Sunlight bathes the dining areas, penetrating the stained glass canopy of the Rotunda and the 30-foot windows of the Empire Room. Conversation buzzes beneath the velveteen notes of a jazz trio. The bustle of mass dining blends but does not collide with gentility.
The guests of honor descend the sweeping staircase from the upper level to the Rotunda's floor, dressed in the linen hues of spring — pink, powder blue, lavender and lime green. Some wear magnificent hats crowned with swirling flowers of white fabric. Four generations of women encircle one of the Empire Room's center tables, a graying dowager beside a squirmy great-granddaughter.
Lines form at the carving stations for maple pecan-glazed Virginia ham and hickory smoked prime rib. Mussels, oysters, smoked shrimp and spicy crawfish spill across another serving table. Omelets, eggs Benedict, fruit marinated in peach schnapps and pepper jack cheese grits stand in for breakfast fare, all served on Villeroy & Boch china.
The operation requires 80 hotel employees to convert the hotel's common areas and meeting rooms to an elegant food bazaar, prepare up to 50 separate food items and entrees, coordinate four separate seatings at 90-minute intervals and clean it all up. For some, the workday may begin before dawn.
The Jefferson begins taking reservations for Mother's Day Brunch in November and may be sold out as early as February. There's brunch every Sunday and Christmas Day, but Mother's Day and Easter draw more than twice an average turnout. The hotel, rated five-star by Mobil, offers special overnight Sunday brunch packages for two, starting at $350, including parking, taxes and gratuity.
The Jefferson, which opened in 1895, is an ivory-tinted stack of towers, rooms, arches and gables that reflect Beaux Arts and Renaissance revival interpretations. It survived fires, neglect, mismanagement, depressed economies and at least one misconception — that the majestic marble stairs from the lobby to the Rotunda was where Rhett confronted Scarlet in the film "Gone with the Wind."
Not true, confirms assistant manager Manning, although the staircase may have been an inspiration for the movie set.
"It's very interesting, this myth, about the filming here," she says, "Even though we tell people it was not, it seems many want to just believe it was."
There's truth enough about The Jefferson to go around. Live alligators lounged in the marble pools in the Palm Court upper lobby until the last one, named Old Pompey, died in 1948. Today, a must-see in any history tour of Richmond is the massive sculpture in the lobby of the hotel's namesake, Thomas Jefferson.
Commissioned by the entrepreneur who opened the hotel, the Jefferson statue took two years to construct. The artist, Edward Valentine, used clothes worn by Jefferson to fashion his likeness. Valentine even helped drag the statue out of the hotel during a 1901 inferno that destroyed more than half the new building.
If Mom and the family are so inclined, the rest of Mother's Day could be spent walking off the feast that The Jefferson offered. The hills of Hollywood Cemetery where James Monroe, John Tyler and Jefferson Davis are buried can provide historical perspective as well as exercise. Across the river and farther south lies the Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens, 25 acres on springtime blossoms regarded by local boosters as the equal of any display of perennials of the East Coast.
Nearer to The Jefferson, visitors can create a self-guided walking tour on Sunday of downtown Richmond that includes the 18th-century home of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, where Robert E. Lee worshipped, and the Virginia State Capitol, designed by Thomas Jefferson. A half mile from the hotel in Jackson Ward is the Maggie L. Walker National Historical Site, a Victorian-style home whose resident overcame poverty to become an African-American editor, civic leader and the first woman in the United States to become a bank president.