Burn, United (Miles), Burn: Lufthansa Business and Senator Lounge Washington Dulles (IAD)

Introduction
Planning
United Global First Lounge Washington Dulles (IAD)
Lufthansa Business and Senator Lounge Washington Dulles (IAD)
ANA First Square Class Washington Dulles to Tokyo Narita
ANA Suite and Business Class Lounges Tokyo Narita (NRT)
ANA Business Class Tokyo Narita to Beijing
IBIS Beijing Capital Airport Hotel
Air China First Class Lounge Beijing (PEK)
BGS Premier Business Class Lounge Beijing (PEK)
Business Traveler’s Lounge Beijing (PEK)
Lufthansa A380 First Class Beijing to Frankfurt
Lufthansa First Class Terminal Frankfurt (FRA)
Lufthansa B747-400 First Class Frankfurt to New York JFK
United PS Business Class New York JFK to San Francisco

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The Lufthansa lounge is the lounge for non-United Star Alliance flights, including my ANA flight, as those seem to mostly depart from the B gates, which is where this lounge is located. There’s the business class part of the lounge which is downstairs (and has a shower), while the senator lounge is located on the same floor as the entrance, which is where I was directed to as a first class passenger. There’s not a separate first class lounge, except for a roped off area in the senator lounge which is supposed to be reserved for Lufthansa first class guests and not first class passengers of other airlines.

My first order of business was to take a shower, having just gotten off a red-eye. The attendant at the entrance told me to go downstairs to the Business lounge and find someone dressed in all black who could help me, but when I wandered downstairs, I only saw one person who worked there, and he was focused on clearing dishes. Eventually, he came over to try to help me, but someone had been in the shower and it needed to be cleaned, so it was probably 30 minutes from the time I went downstairs to the time I was able to take my shower.

The shower room itself was fine (better than my most recent lounge shower in Shanghai), except the water temperature consistently oscillated between cold and scalding hot. I’ve definitely had better showers in most lounges that have showers, and it was inconvenient that they only have a single shower.

The food in the business class section was mostly limited to snack foods, and I found it interesting that there were signs saying that “the local liquor authority does not allow any self-service” when the United Global First Lounge was completely self-service. Can anyone shed light on this difference?

After my shower, I headed up to the Senator Lounge. I was expecting more from the food offerings, but when I was there, there weren’t any hot options unless you wanted to make instant noodles or instant miso soup; in fact, the offerings seemed largely comparable to the Business Lounge downstairs. This didn’t matter a lot to me as I was holding out to eat during the flight, as I was super excited to try ANA’s Japanese kaiseki meal on board.

A benefit of the Senator Lounge as compared to the Business Lounge or the United Global First Lounge were the windows and tarmac views. It was definitely a much nicer space to spend time in given the light.

Overall, the Lufthansa Senator Lounge seemed like a nicer lounge than the United Global First Lounge at IAD, if only because of the windows and tarmac views, so I’d definitely head there if I had a long layover. You’re not going to find great food options in any of the lounges, and if you want to take a shower, you have to head to the Lufthansa Business Lounge.