Grande Hotel do Porto

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Sala das Colunas, the hotel's portico

The Grande Hotel do Porto is a grand hotel of the Belle Époque in Porto . Opened in 1880, it is the oldest existing hotel in Portugal's second largest city.

location

The hotel is located in the center of Porto on Rua de Santa Catarina , the main shopping street and pedestrian zone. It is located north of the Douro River , half a kilometer north-northeast of the cathedral and 300 meters northeast of the Torre dos Clérigos . Porto São Bento train station is 250 meters to the southwest.

history

The architect Silva Sardina designed the five-storey building with a facade in the style of historicism . The hotel opened on March 27, 1880.

The Sala das Colunas (portico), which follows the reception room , was furnished with marble columns, French mirrors and chandeliers . The furnishings have been preserved almost unchanged. The dining room, the Renascença restaurant, also with chandeliers and a stucco ceiling, became the meeting place for the Porto society. The former winter garden was converted into the Douro bar. There are changing exhibitions with works by Portuguese and international artists.

The hotel has 97 rooms, eight of which are suites . Two of the suites are furnished with restored furniture from the 19th century.

In February 1927, the hotel made headlines in the United States. In the year after the end of the First Republic with a military coup and the installation of António Óscar de Fragoso Carmona as Prime Minister, the resistance struggles continued, which also affected US diplomats and politicians. The US consul in Porto stayed at the Grande Hotel do Porto. Five minutes after the consul left his room, a resistance fighter dropped a bomb through the window. The facility was destroyed.

The hotel has had prominent Portuguese and international guests throughout its existence. They included Juan de Borbón y Battenberg , Infanta of Spain and Count of Barcelona, ​​the writer António Lobo Antunes , the journalist Fernando Pessa , the pianist Maria João Pires , the writer Maria Pia de Saxe-Coburgo e Bragança de Laredo , the writer Mário Cláudio , the philosopher and writer Miguel de Unamuno , the Russian clown and pantomime Oleg Popow and the Brazilian musician Roberto Carlos .

In 2002 the hotel was renovated; the style of the house remained unchanged.

In March 2007, the Porto director Manoel de Oliveira shot a scene from the film " Christopher Columbus - The Riddle " in the Grande Hotel do Porto. The film is based on the book "Cristovão Colon era Português" by Manuel Luciano da Silva and Sílvia Jorge da Silva.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ 18th revolution In: Time , February 21, 1927, accessed June 2, 2008

Coordinates: 41 ° 8 ′ 52.7 "  N , 8 ° 36 ′ 24"  W.