Beijing Hotel
{{Short description|Hotel complex in Beijing, China}}
File:Grand Hotel Beijing, Block C.jpg
The Beijing Hotel ({{zh|s=北京饭店|t=北京飯店|p=Běijīng Fàndiàn}}) is a five-star state-owned hotel complex in the Dongcheng District of Beijing, China. It is located at the southern end of Wangfujing Street, at the corner with East Chang'an Avenue, 1.5 km from Beijing railway station with views of the Forbidden City and part of Tiananmen Square.Chinoy, M. China Live: People Power and the Television Revolution. Rowman & Littlefield, 1999. {{ISBN|978-0-8476-9318-4}}.
Overview
The first wing of the Grand Hôtel de Pékin, a five-story red brick structure, was completed in 1915.{{cite web | url=http://www.chinabeijinghotel.com.cn/en/history.html |title=Beijing Hotel Official Website|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110903042333/http://www.chinabeijinghotel.com.cn/en/history.html |archive-date=September 3, 2011 }} A second wing, today known as Block B, was completed in 1917, making the hotel one of the oldest in Beijing.Harper, D. Beijing. Lonely Planet, 2005. {{ISBN|978-1-74059-782-1}}. In 1933 Zhang Jingyao was shot in the building by an assassin. Following the July 7 incident in 1937, the hotel was taken over by Japanese forces and later by the Kuomintang government.Official website History Later, the banquet hall served guests such as Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai at the inauguration of the People's Republic.
A new wing was added on the west side of the 1917 wing of the Beijing Hotel in 1954, it is today known as Block C. The original red brick 1915 wing was demolished for the construction of Block D, on the east, in 1974. At 89 meters, the tower was the tallest building in Beijing at the time. Finally, Block E was built directly behind the 1917 wing in 2001.
The hotel complex today operates under three separate names. In April 2005, Raffles Hotels and Resorts Limited signed an agreement with the Beijing Tourism Group (BTG), to re-brand and manage the historic 1917 Block B in the middle and the modern Block E behind it under the Raffles brand. After carrying out renovations and refurbishment, that portion of the complex was re-launched as Raffles Beijing Hotel ({{zh|s=北京饭店莱佛士|t=北京飯店萊佛士|p=Běijīng Fàndiàn Láifóshì}}) in 2006. The contract ended in 2016 and those blocks were renamed Beijing Hotel NUO on December 1, 2016.{{Cite web|url=https://www.hotelnewsresource.com/article92186.html|title=Raffles Beijing Hotel to Be Renamed Beijing Hotel NUO|website=www.hotelnewsresource.com}} Block C, on the left, is today the Grand Hotel Beijing. The towering Block D, on the right, is today the only remaining wing to use the name Beijing Hotel.
The hotel usually caters to foreigners and wealthy domestic guests, providing restaurants and bars in a Western and Asian style.Watson, J. L. & Caldwell M. L. The Cultural Politics of Food and Eating. Blackwell Publishing, 2005. {{ISBN|978-0-631-23093-9}}. Various members of state have stayed there, including Richard Nixon, U Nu, Nikita Khrushchev, Ho Chi Minh and Sun Yat-sen.{{Cite web |last=Ren |first=Feng |date=December 19, 2019 |title=北京这座神秘的大楼，普通人进去走一圈就能改变命运 |trans-title=In this mysterious building in Beijing, ordinary people can change their fate by walking around |url=https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/98428857 |access-date=2023-01-26 |website=Zhihu |language=zh}} The hotel has been awarded the Five Star Diamond Award for consecutive years. During the 2008 Summer Olympics and the 2022 Winter Olympics, the hotel served as the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee.
Significance
Many foreign journalists were based in the hotel during the spring of 1989. This was the site where Associated Press photographer Jeff Widener took the famous "Tank Man or Unknown Rebel" picture during the Tiananmen Square protests. According to journalist Zhang Boli, the last meetings between the students and government took place at the hotel on May 30, 1989, where no agreement was reached.Zhao, D. The Power of Tiananmen: State-Society Relations and the 1989 Beijing Student Movement. University of Chicago Press, 2004. {{ISBN|978-0-226-98261-8}}.
See also
Gallery
Image:BEIJING HOTEL.JPG|Beijing Hotel, Block D
Image:THE RAFFLES BEIJING HOTEL CHINA OCT 2012 (8802085047).jpg|Beijing Hotel NUO, Block B
Image:北京飯店 旧華北交通本社ビル棟.jpg|Beijing Hotel NUO, Block B
References
{{reflist|30em}}
External links
{{commons category|Beijing Hotel}}
- [http://www.chinabeijinghotel.com.cn/ Beijing Hotel official website] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071217222533/http://www.chinabeijinghotel.com.cn/ |date=2007-12-17 }}
- [https://www.nuohotel.com/beijingchangan Beijing Hotel NUO official website]
- [http://www.grandhotelbeijing.com/ Grand Hotel Beijing official website]
{{Dongcheng District, Beijing}}
{{coord|39.907745|N|116.403987|E|type:landmark|display=title}}
Category:Hotels established in 1915
Category:Hotel buildings completed in 1917
Category:Hotel buildings completed in 1954
Category:Hotel buildings completed in 1974
Category:Hotel buildings completed in 2001
Category:Dongcheng District, Beijing