Hotel National, Moscow

Hotel National, 1904

The National was financed by The Varvarinskoe Joint-Stock Company of Householders[1] and designed by architect Alexander Ivanov. Construction began in 1901 and the 160-room hotel opened on January 14, 1903.

In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution, the capital of Russia was moved to Moscow. In March 1918, the hotel became the home of the first Soviet government. As the Kremlin had been damaged during fighting in October 1917 and was under repair, Lenin made his home in room 107 at the Hotel National with his wife for seven days. The hotel is today marked with a plaque noting this event. The hotel also accommodated other Soviet leaders, including Trotsky and secret police chief Felix Dzerzhinsky.[2] The building continued to be used by the Soviet government afterwards as a hostel for official party delegates, and was renamed First House of Soviets in 1919.

Hotel National, 1935

By 1931 the building was in need of repair and was given a complete renovation to house foreign visitors. It was redecorated with museum-quality furniture and antiques from the palaces of the Tsars and Russian nobility, including Tsarskoye Selo and the Anichkov Palace. The pieces remain in the hotel's collection to this day. The huge mosaic on the hotel's upper corner was replaced with a 120-square meter socialist realist artwork focusing on the industrial might of the Soviet economy. The National reopened under its original name in 1932.[3] The hotel joined Intourist, the state-run tourism monopoly, in 1933.[4]

Hotel Intourist, since demolished, towering over Hotel National

On December 9, 2003, a Chechen female suicide bomber detonated herself outside the hotel. It is thought that her target was the State Duma building across the street and that the bomb detonated prematurely. Six people died and 13 were injured in the blast.

The hotel returned to its original name in 2009 when it moved from the Le Méridien brand to The Luxury Collection.[5]

In 2011 the National, which had previously been owned by the City of Moscow, was privatized and sold to businessman Mikhail Gutseriev for 4.7 billion Rubles.[6]

Interior of the hotel: main stairway

Huge socialist realist artwork atop the hotel

From the start, the hotel was extremely popular with the Russian aristocracy and visiting celebrities and welcomed Anatole France in 1913 and H.G. Wells in 1914. In 1933, it served as the temporary home of the first U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union, William Bullit, until renovation work on the Ambassador's residence at Spaso House was completed. Sergei Prokofiev lived at the hotel for a time in 1933 on his return to the Soviet Union from abroad. Author Mikhail Sholokhov stayed at the hotel frequently in the 1930s.

Pablo Neruda stayed at the National in 1954. American pianist Van Cliburn had one of the hotel's best suites in 1958 during his famous trip to Moscow, and American singer Paul Robeson was also a frequent guest in the 1950s. John Steinbeck stayed at the hotel in 1962 and Armand Hammer made his first of many visits in 1964. Future U.S. president Bill Clinton stayed at the National in 1969 while on a vacation from his studies at Oxford.

His Divine Grace, Srila AC Bhaktivedanta Swami, founder of the Hare Krishna movement, stayed at the hotel during his visit to Moscow in 1971.[7]

In late 1989, multiple scenes for the 1990 film The Russia House were shot in the hotel with stars Sean Connery and Michelle Pfeiffer.[8] In 1990, several scenes for the 1992 film Back in the USSR were filmed inside and outside the hotel, with stars Frank Whaley, Roman Polanski and Natalya Negoda.

In recent years, the hotel has welcomed Jacques Chirac, Kofi Annan, Lech Walesa, Shimon Peres, Donald Trump,[9] Madeleine Albright, Plácido Domingo, Ray Charles, Michel Legrand, Pierre Cardin, Catherine Deneuve, Marcello Mastroianni, Alain Delon, Chris Watson, Jack Nicholson, Sean Penn and Peter Ustinov, among many others.

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