Location Warsaw, Poland | Architect Enrico Marconi | |
 | ||
Address Krakowskie Przedmiescie 13 Opening January 1, 1857 (original building), July 2, 1962 (current building) Owner Przezdziecki and Puslowski families, (1857-1921),
Hotel Europejski S.A. - HESA (1921-1948),
Akademia Wojskowo-Polityczna (1948-1959),
Orbis (1959-2005),
Hotel Europejski S.A. - HESA (2005-) Management Raffles Hotels & Resorts | ||
Hotel Europejski is a historic hotel in the city centre of Warsaw, Poland. Originally opened in 1857, the hotel was badly damaged in World War II and rebuilt in stages throughout the 1950s, reopening as a hotel in 1962.
Contents
Overview
It is located on the historical Royal Route and close to Warsaw Old Town. Facilities include an art gallery and a coffee and pastry shop. The rooms vary in size and shape and most have views overlooking historic parts of Warsaw, including the Royal Tract and the Pilsudski Square.
History
The hotel originally opened on January 1, 1857. Designed by Enrico Marconi, it was one of the most luxurious hotels in the Russian Empire. It was expanded in 1907 to designs by Czeslaw Przybylski. In 1921, the hotel's owners, including the Puslowski family, took on partners to form the company Hotel Europejski Spółka Akcyjna (HESA).
The hotel was renamed the Europäisches Hotel during the German occupation in World War II and used to house Wehrmacht officers. It was severely damaged during the Warsaw Uprising in 1944.
In 1945, after the liberation of Warsaw, the original owners received permission from the government to rebuild the hotel and set up a cafe in the surviving section of the building. However, before they could rebuild, the hotel was seized by the government in 1948 as a result of the Bierut Decrees. The building was rebuilt from 1949-1951 to designs by Bohdan Pniewski as a military school, with a balustrade added along the top, and a recreation of the ruined sections of the exterior. Many surviving interior elements were removed, including the grand staircase and ballrooms, replacing them were dormitories, classrooms and a gymnasium. The building served as the Military Political Academy (Akademia Wojskowa Polityczna) from 1951-1954 and then as offices for the Ministry of Transport. In 1956 the Polish government decided to return the building to its former use as a hotel. From 1956-1957, the empty building was used to house Jewish emigrants from the Soviet Union.
The building was transferred to the Orbis state tourist company in 1959 and converted back to a hotel, with Bohdan Pniewski again serving as architect, along with Bohdan Kijowicz. The resulting hotel had 260 rooms and 13 suites. It reopened to guests on July 2, 1962 as the Orbis Hotel Europejski. In 1965, The Golden Gate Quartet performed their only concert in Poland here.
After the fall of communism, in 1993, the heirs of the hotel's original owners sued to regain the hotel from the state-run Orbis Hotels chain. The case took 12 years, as Orbis claimed they had constructed the current building and invested a great deal of money in it. The heirs were successful in their lawsuit, and the hotel was handed over to them and closed on June 30, 2005. While preparations were made for a complete restoration, spaces on the ground floor were rented out to shops and cafes, and space in the building was rented out as offices. The structure was completely closed in 2013 and gutted and rebuilt from 2013-2015
Future
Reconstruction began in early 2013 and the building will reopen in 2017 with a 100-room hotel managed by Raffles Hotels & Resorts as Raffles Europejski Warsaw and 6,500 m² of Class A office space.