USA Fencing to Open Maison d'Escrime at the Biltmore Los Angeles for LA28

Published May 14, 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

USA Fencing announced Maison d'Escrime, its official hospitality house at the Biltmore Los Angeles for the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

What Maison d'Escrime is

A hospitality house is the sport's living room during a Games: a fixed place where the people connected to a team can gather between sessions instead of scattering across a host city.

Per USA Fencing, Maison d'Escrime will be invitation-only and open during Olympic fencing competition. It will host athletes, families, donors, sponsors, USA Fencing members and special guests.

First of its kind for 2028

USA Fencing describes it as the first sport-specific hospitality house publicly announced by a U.S. national governing body for the 2028 Games.

That is a notable claim. Hospitality houses at Olympics are usually organized by countries, not by individual sports. A single U.S. sport opening its own house — and doing so years in advance — says something about where fencing believes it will be by 2028.

Why the Biltmore location matters

The Biltmore Los Angeles sits roughly one mile from the LA Convention Center, where Olympic fencing will be held.

Anyone who has attended a large fencing event understands the value of that distance. Fencing days are long. Pools in the morning, direct elimination later, waiting in between. A gathering place a mile from the venue is somewhere families can actually reach on foot rather than a location that requires a car and an hour.

USA Fencing's framing

USA Fencing CEO Phil Andrews spoke to the announcement about bringing the fencing community together during the Games. We are paraphrasing rather than quoting, and the original release is linked below for anyone who wants his exact words.

What it means for fencing families

Let's be honest about scope: this is an invitation-only venue in Los Angeles in 2028, and most fencing families will not be inside it. Its relevance to a club in Bethesda is indirect.

But the indirect part is not nothing. A home Games is the single biggest recruiting event a sport gets in a generation. Fencing at Paris 2024 produced a measurable bump in people asking clubs about lessons. A Games on U.S. soil, in a U.S. time zone, with fencing at a downtown convention center, will produce a larger one. Building the infrastructure of attention — including a place where donors, sponsors and media can meet the sport in person — is part of converting that moment into clubs that are still full in 2029.

Two years is a long runway

For a fencer who is 10 or 12 today, LA28 lands in high school. For a fencer who is 15, it lands during or just after college recruiting.

Neither of those fencers needs to plan around a hospitality house. What they need is the ordinary thing: consistent training, regular competition, and enough years in the sport to be good at it when the sport is suddenly on every screen in the country.

Train with us in Bethesda

Saber Nation is a saber-only club at 4701 Sangamore Road, Suite LL2, Bethesda, MD 20816. If LA28 is the reason your family is curious about fencing, the useful first step is a class — see our saber fencing classes in Bethesda or contact us.

Official USA Fencing source: USA Fencing to Open Maison d'Escrime at the Biltmore Los Angeles for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games — published May 14, 2026.

Training options

Continue with The new USA Fencing logo or More USA Fencing news or Saber fencing classes in Bethesda, MD.