The Grand hotel must be one of (if not the) foremost of Europe's most architectural masterpieces. A work of wonder, which is easy to take for granted when seeing it every day
The Grand hotel must be one of (if not the) foremost of Europe's most architectural masterpieces. A work of wonder, which is easy to take for granted when seeing it every day
Built on land formerly belonging to Mrs Cockroft, a boarding housekeeper who in 1862 sold 3 acres of land and her lodgings on the cliff to the Spa Cliff Hotel Company Limited for thirty thousand pounds to erect a large hotel.
Many visitors to Scarborough who do not know the story of the design of this unique hotel are not aware of its creative and ingenious design.
Four Towers to represent the four seasons. Twelve Floors to represent the months of the year.
Fifty-Two chimneys to represent the weeks of the year. Three hundred and sixty-five rooms to represent the days of the year.
The hotel was built in a’V' in honour of Queen Victoria. Such fabulous intuition went into the design of this prestigious individually designed building.
The brickwork alone consisted of six and a quarter million bricks made at Malton's brickworks (Malvern Crescent). The yellow bricks around the windows were from Hunmanby.
However, the initial plans were costly and over-ambitious, and financial problems soon followed, and by 1865 the Scarborough Cliff Hotel Company Limited had run out of money thus, the company was dissolved, and all building work stopped. The hotel had already cost the company and its shareholders ninety thousand pounds (including the price of the land). Worth to day £12.494,919.80
There was too much Speculation as to what would happen to the building. Therefore, the receivers put the property up for sale.
A gentleman from Leeds bid £43,600 at the auction worth to day £6.537,538.92, which the owners accepted.
The new company name then changed to ’The Grand Hotel Company Limited'
