Opening 1922 | Number of rooms 630 | |
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Location Glória, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | ||
The Hotel Gloria was a grand hotel in the Glória neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro. Construction was ordered by the Brazilian President to it was built by entrepreneur Roche Miranda for the International Exhibition of 1922 to commemorate the Centenary of Brazil's independence. It opened on August 15, 1922. The hotel was designed by Joseph Gire, who also designed the Copacabana Palace. It was reportedly the first reinforced concrete building to be built in South America and was erected with the aid of German engineers.
Originally the hotel had a casino (which no longer exists), a theatre, ballrooms, recreation areas, and only about 280 rooms but was later expanded to about 630. Due to its proximity to the financial and political centre of the city of Rio de Janeiro, Hotel Gloria always harbored great artists of cinema, singers, politicians, and heads of state.
The hotel was built with 180 rooms. It was expanded by 100 rooms with a wing to the southwest, and a 400-room addition was added at an unknown date. The Hotel Gloria has a reinforced concrete skeleton, and each room had a bathroom and a telephone. It was later furnished with a swimming pool, a steam sauna, an automatic phone billing system, a meeting room and equipment for video-conferences, and a heliport.
In 2009, the hotel closed for a complete restoration and refurbishment.