St. Pancras Renaissance London Hotel

St. Pancras Renaissance London Hotel
St Pancras Renaissance London Hotel
Location within Central London
General information
Location	Euston Road, London, England
Coordinates	51°31′48″N 0°07′31″W / 51.53000°N 0.12528°W / 51.53000; -0.12528Coordinates: 51°31′48″N 0°07′31″W / 51.53000°N 0.12528°W / 51.53000; -0.12528
Opening	2011
Owner	Manhattan Loft Corporation
Management	Marriott International
Height	82m (269ft)
Design and construction
Architect	George Gilbert Scott
Developer	Manhattan Loft Corporation
Other information
Number of rooms	207
Number of suites	38
Number of restaurants	1
Website
Official website

The St. Pancras Renaissance London Hotel is a hotel in London, England, forming the frontispiece of St Pancras railway station. It opened in 2011, and occupies much of the former Midland Grand Hotel designed by George Gilbert Scott which opened in 1873 and closed in 1935. The building as a whole including the apartments is known as St Pancras Chambers and between 1935 and the 1980s was used as railway offices. Its clock tower stands at 82m tall, with more than half its height usable.k

The upper levels of the original building were redeveloped between 2005 and 2011 as apartments by the Manhattan Loft Corporation.

In 1865 the Midland Railway Company held a competition for the design of a 150-bed hotel to be constructed next to its railway station, St Pancras, which was still under construction at the time. Eleven designs were submitted, including one by George Gilbert Scott, which, at 300 rooms, was much bigger and more expensive than the original specifications. Despite this, the company liked his plans and construction began.

The east wing opened in 1873, and the rest followed in Spring 1876. The hotel was expensive, with costly fixtures including a grand staircase, rooms with gold leaf walls and a fireplace in every room. It had many innovative features such as hydraulic lifts, concrete floors, revolving doors and fireproof floor constructions, though (as was the convention of the time) none of the rooms had bathrooms. The hotel was taken over by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway in 1922 before closing in 1935, by which time its utilities were outdated and too costly to maintain, such as the armies of servants needed to carry chamber pots, tubs, bowls and spittoons.

After closing as a hotel, the building was renamed St Pancras Chambers and used as railway offices, latterly for British Rail. British Rail had hoped to demolish it, but was thwarted in a high-profile campaign by Jane Hughes Fawcett and her colleagues at the Victorian Society, a historic preservationist organisation founded in part to preserve the Victorian railways and other buildings. Officials dubbed Jane Fawcett the "furious Mrs. Fawcett" for her unceasing efforts, and in 1967, the Hotel and the St. Pancras station received Grade I listed status.