Winners 2009

Winners Area

World's Leading Luxury Hotel 2009

And the winner is...

Grand Hotel Europe

Winner Profile | belmond.com/grand-hotel-europe-st-petersburg/

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Meet the Winner

The Grand Hotel Europe has entertained the world’s royalty as well as its masters of culture and politics since 1875. Now this stunning palace’s historic first floor has been renovated to reflect its illustrious heritage.

Along Nevsky Prospekt and Mikhailovskaya Street stretches one of the finest hotels of the continent. The building itself is an architectural monument – the ground and first floors are protected by St. Petersburg’s historical and cultural policy – so the recent reconstruction work has meticulously preserved the hotel’s art nouveau interiors and neo-classical façade.

Tchaikovsky spent his honeymoon there. Johann Strauss occupied “comfort room No 26” for 14 days. Dimitri Shostakovitch played a sonata for Sergey Prokofiev in his suite, Elton John performed at the restaurant, and George Bernard Shaw met there with Maxim Gorky. Rasputin dined there, Queen Elizabeth II praised the hotel’s kitchen and the Romanov royal family continue to gather at the hotel for reunions.