Tenleytown Ace Hardware
Category: Hardware Stores [Edit]
Neighborhood: Tenleytown4500 Wisconsin Ave NW
(between N Albemarle St & N Murdock Mill Rd)
Washington, DC 20016 (202) 364-1902
- Nearest Transit:
Tenleytown-AU (Red)
- Price Range: $$
- Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
- Parking: Garage, Validated
- Wheelchair Accessible: Yes
10 Reviews for Tenleytown Ace Hardware
The customer service at this store is great. We just moved and needed to make copies of our keys. We went in on Thursday and had copies made, only to find out they didn't work. On Friday we went back and a manager personally helped us in having our replacement keys made. She told us if we had anymore problems then to just come back and they'd make us another copy, but this time the keys were perfect.
I've also come in with very vague descriptions of things I need (a bed part that went missing from my Ikea bed and I didn't have a picture, just what I knew it looked like),and gotten help. The guy helping me knew exactly what I was talking about and found it for me in just a few minutes.
Ace of Base...ments
This is my go-to hardware store since I'm a Tenley Townie! Besides,
They had all the parts needed to convert a 10-gallon Igloo cooler into a beer-making mash tun. That's saying something.
You recall those "Survey of Western Literature" Norton anthologies (when you were actually awake in class)? That's a decent desription of this Ace. It has a little of everything, but not a lot of anything. Didn't Abe Lincoln say something like "You can sell all your nuts and bolts sometimes, and some of your washers all of the time...."? Maybe I'm misremembering.
The highlights of this Ace are that they have quick supplies for clogged toilets and other minor plumbing emergencies, enough garden supplies for most jobs (including mulch and topsoil), vacuums, and just enough electrical parts to get you in trouble. Don't come here to buy in bulk for renovation. Come here for the proper diet and nutrition needed for an old house to keep operating without major problems.
The pimple-sporting high-school help here is unfailingly polite and willing to search for what you need. They'll haul mulch bags to your car, cut tubing to length, dig up stainless steel #4 washers, and look successfully nonplussed when you ask for a 3/4 inch flared copper barb for your brewhouse. All in all, I'd rather schlep here than anywhere for the basics of daily living in an old house.
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For $25 you can rent a steam cleaner for 24 hours. This will save you hundreds of dollars if you want to clean carpets in your home or apartment. You will not believe how disgusting you are until you use one of these things. (I think they have them at Home Depots too, I think they're called 'Rug Doctors'.)
All the paint colors in the world, great prices. Something like $11 a quart for semi-glossy, and now my walls look bright and great.
How to get there: Go into the big building at the Tenleytown stop that houses the Best Buy and Container Store, find a down escalator, take it down to the underground parking garage. The main entrance is from the parking garage, the whole store is underground.
Young and funny staff, good attitudes. I wish they had plants and better selections for lamps.
These guys are super. Now I love hardware stores and going to Home Depot is fun, but TT is just on another level. Really helpful/knowledgeable people and great stock selection. I just wish they were open a little later on Sunday.
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"Tenleytown Hardware" is actually a misnomer! This store is actually the Tenleytown location of "Ace Hardware", which is a chain store with locations across the country. There are about 16 of them in the DC/Metro area alone. Lucky us! :)
The Tenley location is great because I can pick things up on the way to or from work or the gym. The store brand items are good quality and generally cheaper than more name brands, but the name brand stuff is a bit more expensive than it would be elsewhere- it's a sort of hardware-convenience store in that sense. They also have a buyer's card and sales announcements for members.
Recently, though, I had a funny experience- I wanted to paint my yellow bathroom blue. The salesgirl I spoke to (won't give her name) urged me to buy primer because otherwise I'd get green spots! Perhaps she thought my walls were still wet? Anyway, I ended up with a gallon of sky blue primer (which was supposed to be lighter than the paint, but wasn't) and identically shaded paint. She'd dissuaded me from getting quarts and while a gallon was cheaper I have tons of blue paint, now, that I can't use.
Still, it's a nice neighborhood place and I'm more prone to head there when I need something than Home Depot or Lowe's, which are farther away and much more intimidating in terms of size and impersonality.
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I don't know much about hardware - so I always feel out of place in any hardware store (especially Home Depot - but that's another story for another day...). Any time I've come here, someone has always helped me find the things I needed and made sure I understood what to do/how to use them.
Bonus for being conveniently located by the metro - downstairs from Best Buy and the Container Store.
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I don't know why I haven't reviewed this place yet, since I've been coming here for almost a year now, but after my visit today, I had to say something. I love Ace Hardware Tenley b/c the staff is awesome. Today I was asked FIVE (YES FIVE) times (five different people, too!) if I needed help. Go to Home Depot and wait for someone to ask you if you need help. I had to practically drop dead in the middle of the paint section for someone to notice me one time (at Home Depot). Oh, and don't get me started on walking from the Metro up to HD....yeah it's a lot of fun getting whistled at by all the construction dudes on the side of the road while you walk up that huge hill (guys, I don't know if you have this problem, probably not, but if you're a chick w/two legs, T&A, forget it, you might as well keep that dirty look on your face for the entire 7 minute walk it takes to get there). Anyway, I know Ace has a smaller selection than Lowe's or HD, but seriously, they have a lot packed in that tiny basement, and it's the service that counts. If you are a home how-to know-it-all and it annoys you to be asked constantly if you need help, then perhaps this isn't the place for you....but you should give it a try anyway.
Ok this review is getting long, but whatever, one quick story:
I went in there and asked how to mount this middle eastern rug to my wall. The guy spent 30 minutes helping me figure out a way to make it look good and not cost me too much. He really cared, or maybe he was just really good at acting...either way, you can't get that service many places.
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This little store seems to have most of what you need in a hardware store - very well stocked. There is free one-hour validated parking below the Best Buy, and then you can walk right into the hardware store. Access the parking lot from Brandywine St (I think that's it) going east up the hill from River to Wisconsin.
Yes - this is an ACE hardware but I think they are franchises and independently owned - or at least that was the impression I got. The people are very friendly and helpful, although not always as knowledgable as Strosneider's in Bethesda. If you doubt the perrson's expertise, just ask if there is anyone else who is really familiar with the product/issue and they will find you someone.
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It's no Hechingers, but the Tenley Town Ace is worth three stars. It's metro accessible and has a little bit of everything. I'm not sure if this is PC or not, but it often appears to be staffed by local high school kids, so I was not expecting great service, but they have been very nice and proactive in asking me if I need help finding anything. It's not a huge store, but slightly larger than the neighborhood places you find around town, so you may find things others don't have the room to stock and avoid a trip to the burbs.
Store is located in the garage below the Best Buy and Container Store. I have found myself heading upstairs to the CS when I can't find things at Ace.
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Tenleytown Hardware - brought to you by the people who brought you Logan and Glover Park Hardware - doesn't have the sheer size of, say, a Home Depot, but that's incidental. It's got all the basics and then some, a very knowledgeable staff who made this home improvement novice feel comfortable and not stupid (though I'm hella ignorant of hardware and its peripherals), and the most convenient location in NW DC, just above the red line's Tenleytown/AU metro and on the corner of the major intersection of River Road and Wisconsin. Seriously, the staff makes this place a winner. They seem sincerely happy to help (and this being DC, actually running into genuine sincerity is pretty cool).
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