AS I WALKED into Le Bar (806 15th St. NW; 202/737-8800) for the first time a few weeks ago, I read its name on the dooreyeballed its opulent interior and did a quick mental compare-and-contrast. See, one of my favorite dives is a place in Baltimore called simply "Bar," a vertical sign with just those three letters hanging over the front door. It's noisy, dirty and pretty dang great, and I love the simplicity of its name.

But I'm here to tell you that Le Bar, in the Sofitel Hotel at the corner of 15th and H, is also pretty dang great, for utterly opposite reasons: it's plush and hushed and sleek and lovely. That two-letter French word sure makes a world of difference.

So does a boatload of cash from Accor Hotels and Resorts, the parent company of the global Sofitel hotel chain. Accor took over the 1920s corner office building a year ago and quickly turned it into a hotel, restaurant and bar, taking the bronze-and-marble beauty and adding a contemporary luster without showing off.

"We're a French-based company," says Sebastian Carre, the hotel's director of operations, "and part of the positioning of the hotel is very much to do with the French art de vivre, which doesn't translate well if you just say 'the art of living,' but if you come in, you understand. It's in the service, the atmosphere, our relationship with each customer."

Carre speaks the truth. The doorman said "Welcome back, monsieur" the second time I stopped in, more than a week after my first visit. The hostess at Le Bar greeted me like I was a favorite regular on my first visit, and when I sat at the bar, the bartender made sure everything was just right without the obsequious over-attentiveness that sometimes spoils upscale bars.

"Our objective is really very simple," says Carre, whose subtle French accent is echoed in nearly all the employees. "Le Bar should just be a nice place to be. There's a focus on the pleasant, regardless of the time of the day and your purpose for being in the bar at the time."

Focus on the pleasant. I like the way this man thinks. Carre has translated the French plaisant directly into English, but "pleasant" sounds so tepid, given the French meaning of plaisant, which is all about what is pleasing to the senses.

He's talking about Tony Bennett then Art Tatum on the sound system, at just the right level. About the dishes of dark, strong Mediterranean olives and mixed roasted nuts (not a peanut in sight) that await you at the bar or on the table tops. About the single roses in small dark vases on each table. About the low, wide armchairs upholstered in soft cream-and-black fabric, 30 or so of them around the room, arranged to create cozy discrete spaces. Even crowded, Le Bar never gets loud. Ambient noise is absorbed by the thick carpeting and curtains, or just floats up to the 20-foot ceilings.

While the dark mahogany bar and the deep red and green curtains pay stylistic homage to Washington's more somber downtown bars, those high ceilings and huge picture windows preclude any sense of private club heaviness. It's a beautiful space, and is as comfortable in daylight as it is after dark.

There are just three beers on tap, but good choices: the Belgian Stella Artois and Leffe and the Irish Bass Ale. And the cocktail list includes such signature drinks as the L'Enfant (Grey Goose vodka, Chambord, Grand Marnier and lemonade), Lafayette (Stoli Raspberry, Cointreau, pineapple, grenadine) and the Marquis de Rochambeau (Grey Goose vodka, dry vermouth, anchovies and olives). I had to order that last one since my pop once picked grapes on the French estate of General Rochambeau's descendant, but I have to admit the anchovy taste wasn't to my liking, and I quickly moved to the Jackson (Absolut vodka, blue curacao and lemon juice). (I'll always use a blue drink as my fallback.)

I eagerly await the day later this month (or perhaps in September, management says, depending on organizational issues in the kitchen) when you can order food in Le Bar off the menu of its adjacent restaurant, Cafe 15. Right now, it's just olives and nuts, and while they're perfectly pleasant, the notion of sitting in those nice armchairs eating some of Cafe 15's elaborate French dishes while listening to Tony Bennett sounds like my idea of plaisant.