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42-644: The original builders referred to themselves as the Carlton Hotel Company of Montreal, with the concept of naming the hotel after London's celebrated Carlton Hotel . However, one of the investors, Charles Hosmer , was a personal friend of César Ritz , and persuaded his colleagues to incorporate the Ritz name associated with the success of the Hôtel Ritz Paris , which opened in 1898. For a fee of C$ 25,000, César Ritz agreed to lend his name, but stipulated that by

84-540: A pastry chef under Escoffier, but the claim lacks documentary evidence. Nonetheless the London Vietnam Association erected a Blue Plaque on the hotel's site marking the connection. During the Second World War the hotel was badly damaged by German bombing in 1940. The residential parts of the building were permanently closed. In 1942 remaining parts of the building were requisitioned as offices by

126-660: A biographer of Escoffier, has written, "From its opening [the Carlton] attracted much of the Savoy's clientele, including the Prince of Wales and the Marlborough House set. It paid out a dividend of 7 per cent in its first year to its influential financial and aristocratic backers, and for many years it was considered the finest hotel in London." Ritz's satisfaction at pulling ahead of the Savoy

168-578: A few years earlier. Without Ritz, the Carlton had no hotelier of flair to compete with Carte. Nevertheless, with Escoffier presiding in the kitchens, the Carlton continued to be one of London's leading hotels, yielding substantial profits for its shareholders. Apart from two spells of poor results, the first in the early years of the First World War and the second at the beginning of the Great Depression ,

210-580: A hotel on the site alongside. The actor-manager Herbert Beerbohm Tree agreed to take a lease of the theatre, the Office of Woods approved the plans, and building started in July 1896. When building work began, César Ritz and Auguste Escoffier were employed by Richard D'Oyly Carte as manager and chef de cuisine respectively at the Savoy Hotel . They were already planning to set up independently, and had established

252-709: A night or two with only a single bag. Many of its in-house residents were not as badly affected as their American counterparts following 1929; they stayed loyal to the hotel. In the 1930s, when the widows and residents of the Golden Square Mile began to downsize from their mansions, many prominent people took rooms in the hotel, such as Lady Shaughnessy and founder Charles Hosmer 's son, Elwood, who, between him and his sister, had inherited $ 20 million from their father in 1927. The hotel had guests such as Winston Churchill , Charles de Gaulle , Marlene Dietrich , Liberace , Tyrone Power and Maurice Chevalier . However, as

294-826: A prolific architectural firm in Montreal and across Canada. The ten-storey, 1036-room hotel was the largest in the British Empire. It was erected on the former site of the High School of Montreal at 1455 Peel Street. The construction of the Mount Royal Hotel in the Beaux-Arts architectural style was part of a larger trend in what was the largest city in Canada to attract high-class tourists with luxurious edifices. Other famous buildings by Ross and Macdonald in Montreal include Holt Renfrew ,

336-403: A site of historical importance, combined with modern styles, luxury and services. In 1971, Richard Nixon stayed there, and in 1972, The Rolling Stones booked out the entire sixth floor, but were refused service in the main dining room for not being suitably attired; they later returned in jackets. In 1976, the hotel received two famous guests, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip , as well as

378-559: The Earl of Dudley . Dudley died in 1885, when the lease had six years left to run. In 1890, the Commissioners entered into a building agreement with the property developer Tod Heatley to redevelop the site. After prolonged negotiation and litigation, the development was taken over in 1895 by Law Guarantee and Trust Society, Ltd, which commissioned the theatre architect C. J. Phipps to draw up plans to rebuild Her Majesty's Theatre and to construct

420-712: The Montreal Neurological Institute , the downtown Eaton's building (now Complexe les Ailes), the Dominion Square Building and Trinity Memorial Church in Westmount . The hotel opened on December 20, 1922, managed by the United Hotels Company . It was sold by its owners, Cardy Hotels, to Sheraton Hotels in 1950, along with the company's other Canadian properties in Quebec and Ontario. The hotel

462-483: The Mount Royal Club were later known as the Golden Square Mile . The Wall Street Crash of 1929 was followed by the Great Depression and then World War II . The Swiss General Manager, Émile Charles des Baillets, had been with the hotel since 1924. In 1929, he lamented that before, guests had come to stay for several weeks accompanied by trains of luggage, but during this time, when they did come, they came for

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504-697: The Presidential Suite for all of 1921. As the founders had hoped, two-thirds of the guests at the Ritz-Carlton took suites comprising several rooms and lived there permanently for $ 29 a month. The First World War made standards difficult to keep, and in 1922, in direct rivalry to the Ritz-Carlton, the Mount Royal Hotel , was erected as the largest hotel in the British Empire . The Ritz-Carlton and

546-403: The Prince of Wales made the first royal visit , staying in the seventeen-room Royal Suite . Queen Marie of Romania , Prince Felix of Luxembourg and Prince George, Duke of Kent also stayed at the hotel in the 1920s. Several movie idols stayed, such as Lillie Langtry , Mary Pickford , and Douglas Fairbanks . Former US President William Howard Taft and his wife "entertained lavishly" in

588-521: The Ritz Hotel London ) to found the Carlton Hotel Company of Montreal. The land on which the hotel was built was purchased from Charles Meredith , who became the fifth principal shareholder. The hotel was designed by the architectural firm Warren and Wetmore , and it was completed at a cost of C$ 2 million. Its doors officially opened at 11:15 pm on New Year's Eve , 1912, marked by a gala ball attended by 350 guests. On Valentine's Day , 1916,

630-662: The "Ritz standards," every room was to have its own bathroom, there was to be a kitchen on every floor so room-service meals could be served course by course, and around-the-clock valet and concierge service were to be made available to the guests for, amongst other duties, tracking lost luggage or ordering theatre tickets. Finally, the lobby was to be small and intimate, with a curved grand staircase for ladies to show off their ball gowns on their descent. Around 1820, John Bigsby observed that Montreal's hotels were "as remarkable for their palatial exteriors as they are for their excellent accommodation within." Donegana's Hotel became

672-505: The 2002 Concordia University Netanyahu riot . The Ritz-Carlton Montreal closed in 2008 for renovation and reopened after a $ 200 million restoration. Today, the hotel is part of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, LLC., owned by Marriott International . Unlike other Ritz-Carlton hotels, the hotel is still using a lion emblem. The hotel has 96 rooms and 33 suites, including the Royal Suite, which consists of 4,700 square feet and 3 bedrooms. When

714-509: The British government, although the American Bar and grill room of the hotel remained open. The hotel never reopened. In 1949 the company sold the unexpired portion of its lease to the government of New Zealand for £325,000; the site was proposed for the new High Commission of New Zealand . In 1951 The Carlton Hotel Limited went into voluntary liquidation. The hotel was demolished in 1957–58, and

756-523: The Carlton remained profitable until the Second World War. The Manchester Guardian commented that the hotel's "grill room looked very old fashioned and glum in latter years, but still Mr. Andrew Mellon and other major millionaires thought it the only satisfactory place in London." The future Vietnamese communist leader Ho Chi Minh allegedly worked at the Carlton Hotel during 1913, training as

798-525: The Crown, and decorated and equipped by Messrs. Waring and Gillow , Limited. It contains upwards of 250 bed and sitting rooms, which are arranged both en suite and separately, and decorated and furnished in 18th century English and French styles. Private bath rooms are attached to the suites, and there is also ample general accommodation in this respect, there being altogether about 80 bath rooms. In addition to smoking, reading, dining, reception, and retiring rooms …

840-623: The Dames and Messieurs of the Ritz-Carlton, all the employees and their spouses were invited to dine at the Café de Paris. The Ritz-Carlton also makes a feature in the 1996 film, Matilda . Other leading figures of the 20th century that stayed at the Ritz-Carlton Montreal include Charles de Gaulle , George H. W. Bush , and Céline Dion . Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took refuge there during

882-477: The High Commission was built on the site. 51°30′28″N 0°07′53″W  /  51.5078°N 0.1315°W  / 51.5078; -0.1315 Les Cours Mont-Royal Les Cours Mont-Royal is an upscale shopping mall in the city's downtown core of Montreal , Quebec , Canada, which was converted from the former Mount Royal Hotel . The Mount Royal Hotel was designed by Ross and Macdonald ,

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924-567: The Hotel contains a Palm Court on the ground floor. … Each bed room is fitted with a telephone enabling visitors to communicate with any part of the hotel service, or to be switched on to the trunk line. Hair-dressing rooms, boy messenger service, theatre box office and every other adjunct of an hotel of the very highest order are provided. Construction of the hotel was not yet complete when Phipps died in 1897. The architectural partnership of Lewis Isaacs and Henry L. Florence were appointed to complete

966-715: The Ritz Hotel Development Company, when Carte dismissed them both in 1897 for financial irregularities. After successfully opening the Hôtel Ritz in Paris the following year, Ritz agreed to take a 72-year Crown lease of the new hotel in London. A limited company, The Carlton Hotel, Limited, was formed. The name Carlton comes from Carlton House , the nearby former home of the Prince Regent . The company's prospectus stated: The Hotel has been erected from plans approved by

1008-484: The Savoy Hotel and the other hotels in his ownership, such as Claridge's . When Claridge's needed a new chef in 1904, Carte secured the services of François Bonnaure, formerly chef at the Élysée Palace in Paris. The press speculated on how much Carte must have paid to persuade Bonnaure to join him, and compared the younger Carte's audacity with his father's coup in securing Paris's most famous maître d'hôtel , M. Joseph,

1050-652: The building in 1942. After the Second World War the shareholders of the hotel sold the lease of the site, and the surviving parts of the building were demolished in 1957–58. The site is now occupied by the 17-storey block of the New Zealand High Commission . The site, on the corner of the Haymarket and Pall Mall , part of the Crown Estate , was leased by the Commissioners of Woods, Forests and Land Revenues to

1092-589: The building. The Survey of London quoted a contemporary critic, Edwin Sachs, who commented on the hotel and theatre: "The treatment is considered to be in the French Renaissance style and stone has been used throughout. The detail cannot, however, be termed satisfactory, nor does the exterior architecturally express the purpose of the building." The Survey adds, however: "Present-day connoisseurs of late-Victorian architecture are less censorious, and many will regret

1134-541: The custom of formal dress , of either white tie or black tie , to suits in order to allow more people to dine at the hotel. Nonetheless, the change led to the hotel's larger profits. In 1947, the hotel was sold to François Dupré , who formed a new board of directors and named himself president. Already the owner of two prestigious hotels in Paris — Hotel George V, Paris and the Plaza Athénée —Dupré brought with him some of

1176-655: The first Canadian transcontinental telephone call was made from the hotel. An audience of two hundred businessmen was said to have listened as the Chairman of the Bell Telephone Company enquired: "Hello. Is this Vancouver ?" The clear reply—"Yes"—was met with approval and toasted with champagne . In 1918, Lord Birkenhead described the hotel as "very luxurious and comfortable," and the American Bankers Association held its annual meetings there. In 1919,

1218-453: The first time, as the Spa St. James moved into the hotel from its prior location in a historic building on Crescent Street . Carlton Hotel, London The Carlton Hotel was a luxury hotel in London that operated from 1899 to 1940. It was designed by the architect C. J. Phipps as part of a larger development that included the rebuilding of Her Majesty's Theatre , which is adjacent to

1260-475: The flair of César Ritz . He opened Le Bar Maritime in 1948 and in the early 1950s, added the Ritz Garden , where patrons could dine around a flower-fringed pond , which was home to twenty-four ducklings . In 1957, a new wing consisting of sixty-seven rooms and suites was added, and care was taken to maintain the original Ritz -influenced Louis XVI and Carlton -influenced Regency styles and ambiance. When

1302-409: The hotel completed its renovations in 2012, the Royal Suite was the largest hotel room in Canada, renting for $ 7,000 to $ 10,000 per night. Since 2012, the hotel's main restaurant is Maison Boulud, named for the celebrity chef Daniel Boulud . The hotel also offers afternoon tea in the refurbished Palm Court. The rooftop is equipped with a saltwater infinity pool. In 2015, the hotel added a spa for

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1344-523: The hotel site. The Carlton was originally run by the Swiss hotelier César Ritz , with Auguste Escoffier as the head chef. In its early days it was one of London's most fashionable hotels and drew some customers away from the Savoy Hotel , which Ritz and Escoffier had previously managed. The hotel lost some of its prestige after Ritz retired, but continued to trade profitably until it was badly damaged by German bombing in 1940. The British government requisitioned

1386-620: The largest in the British Colonies in the 1840s, and the Windsor had been Montreal 's preeminent hotel in the 1870s. By 1909, some of the city's wealthiest citizens wanted a modern "first class residential hotel ". The citizens, led by Charles Hosmer (a personal friend of César Ritz ), Sir Herbert Holt , Sir Montagu Allan , and Sir Charles Gordon, met with the Hon. Lionel Guest (a first cousin of Winston Churchill ) and Harry Higgins (Chairman of

1428-402: The last of the loyal Square Milers were dying off, the hotel began to fall into debt. Wartime shortages made it difficult to maintain the graceful living standards set by the original founders. The General Manager, des Baillets, was succeeded by Albert Frossard in 1940, another native of Switzerland . Unhappily, and not without a fight, Frossard had to bow to the directors' commands to relax

1470-484: The lobby and reception areas were enlarged and 100 rooms and suites had been redecorated. In 1984, Brian Mulroney was using the hotel regularly, and Pierre Elliott Trudeau became a regular after having taken up residence at his nearby art deco mansion, Maison Cormier , in the same year. In 1988, the year of its 75th anniversary, the Ritz-Carlton Montreal welcomed the Queen Mother . The same year, in order to celebrate

1512-586: The most renowned award for a hotel: the AAA Five Diamond distinction. In 1977, champagne corks were popped at the Oval Room party, at which 600 guests bade farewell to esteemed General Manager Fred Laubi while welcoming his successor. At the age of 36, Fernand Roberge was appointed the first French-Canadian general manager of the hotel. Under his command, terrycloth bathrobes, French toiletries, bathroom scales, and large umbrellas were placed in every room. By 1979,

1554-590: The original hotel is the original lobby, which contains a huge chandelier taken from the Monte Carlo casino. The shopping area is organized around four large courts, hence the French name "Les Cours". Under the main skylight there are six bird-human sculptures by the Inuit artist David Ruben Piqtoukun . The top of the building has several floors of luxury condos. They have separate elevators and entrances, set apart from those of

1596-517: The partial demolition of a building which, though overspiced with eclectic details, had considerable panache." In the prospectus, the directors of The Carlton Hotel Limited wrote, "Mr. Ritz and the Directors believe that the hotel and restaurant will at once take precedence of similar establishments in London." The most conspicuous "similar establishment" was the Savoy, which found its status as London's most fashionable hotel under threat. F. Ashburner,

1638-411: The renovation was complete, Howard Hughes was the first person to check in, booking out over half of the eighth floor. Between 1959 and 1969, the image of the hotel was more like that of a gentlemen's club . It catered to Montreal's old money . However, it was publicly known for the wedding of Elizabeth Taylor to Richard Burton that took place in the Royal Suite in 1964. By 1970, it was updated to

1680-421: The shopping centre's street doors and subway tunnels. In between the top condo levels and the mall at the base there are several floors of office space. Les Cours Mont-Royal Shopping Centre is mainly composed of fashion retailers, with a few additional features and services including Montreal's largest spa (Spa Diva), a medical clinic (Les Cours Medical Centre) and a catwalk for fashion shows and other events. It

1722-612: Was renamed the Sheraton-Mt. Royal Hotel in 1951. The hotel left Sheraton on March 31, 1982, when the nearby Le Centre Sheraton Hotel opened to replace it. The Mt. Royal Hotel closed on November 17, 1984. The building was gutted and renovated at a cost of $ 140 million and converted to a mixed-use complex with a shopping mall in the lower levels and basement, connected to the Underground City , and offices above. It reopened in 1988 as Les Cours Mont-Royal . The only interior remnant of

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1764-482: Was short lived. At the height of the fame of the Carlton, Ritz was preparing to mark the coronation of Edward VII in 1902 with much-publicised and elaborate festivities when the king suddenly fell ill, and the coronation was postponed indefinitely. The shock caused Ritz to suffer a severe nervous breakdown and sent him into retirement, leaving Escoffier as the figurehead at the Carlton. Richard D'Oyly Carte had died in 1901, but his son Rupert D'Oyly Carte reinvigorated

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