Hotel Cecil was a hotel on the Strand in London built on scandal. It was a truly vast building that dominated the Thames embankment but was demolished in 1930 and replaced by Shell Mex House. Many would have torn down the hotel with their bare hands having lost their savings in a scam perpetrated by the man who built the Hotel Cecil between 1890 and 1896.
The fraudster was a Liberal Party politician, Jabez Balfour – who was the member of parliament for Tamworth and then later Burnley. His company, the Liberator Building Society, funded construction of the hotel but Balfour was arrested and imprisoned for embezzlement in 1892 leaving investors out of pocket. A new company continued the building work, which created the largest hotel in Europe. It was a truly gargantuan structure.
An 1890s guide to London I own describes the building in scornful terms:
It was one of the outcomes of the notorious Liberator Society, whose shameful transactions led to the ruin of thousands of poor investors and for which the promotors have been justly punished.
With 800 rooms and riverside views, it became a centre of the “flapper” scene in the 1920s. Its jazz band was well regarded on the music scene in the city. The dancing took place in the vast Palm Court at the centre of the hotel, which was an extraordinary space. Very sad it’s no longer with us.
But by 1930, the party was over. The hotel was sold to Shell, which decided to demolish most of the hotel, though the Strand-facing frontage was retained and can still be seen today, integrating a row of shops. The classified advertisement section of the broadsheet newspapers listed an astonishing amount of items from the hotel. This included furniture from the hundreds of rooms; banqueting and ballrooms; and four Masonic temples in the hotel.
