Opening 1892 Floor count 7 Number of suites 12 | Owner Nishat Group Number of rooms 56 | |
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Location 7-8, Park Place, St. James's, London SW1A 1LP, England, United Kingdom | ||
The St James's Hotel and Club is a hotel at 7-8, Park Place, St. James's, London SW1A 1LP. The hotel is part of the Lahore based Nishat Group which is owned by Pakistani Mian Mohammad Mansha. The hotel has fifty-six rooms and twelve suites, many of which have their own terraces, plus a penthouse with a party deck for sixty people.
History
A club known as the Field Club was at 7, Park Place, in 1889. On 13 May 1889, the police raided the club and found baccarat in progress. Twenty-one persons were arrested, "among whom were three English and several French and Belgian noblemen..." Among those arrested were the Earl of Dudley (later Governor-General of Australia), William Brownlow, 3rd Baron Lurgan, son of Charles Brownlow, 2nd Baron Lurgan, 'Lord Paulet' (probably a son of the 15th Marquess of Winchester) and Baron Ferraro. The current hotel says at its website that it "first opened its doors, as a gentlemen's chamber for the English aristocracy, in 1892." At that time the original St James's Club was elsewhere, and in fact the buildings at 7-8, Park Place, were erected as blocks of flats in 1891-92. They were originally planned with forty-four sets of residential chambers, plus service rooms. The sporting Sir John Dugdale Astley, 3rd Baronet, died in his chambers at 7, Park Place, 10 October 1894. By 1960, the flats were being called Old St James's House, a name apparently without historical support. In the spring of 2008, following extensive renovation, the building was reopened as 'The St James's Hotel and Club'. Within the hotel is the renovated and repurposed space St James's Club founded by Peter de Savary, who marketed it to resonate with the panache associated with the historic St James's Club founded in 1857 by Earl Granville and the Marchese d'Azeglio. The team of the St James’s Hotel and Club received the Olympic torch on the day before the opening of the Games. On 5 November 2010 Pakistani Nishat Group bought the hotel for 60 million pounds.