Gleneagles Hotel

Gleneagles Hotel
Gleneagles Hotel and surrounding grounds
General information
Location	Auchterarder Perthshire, Scotland PH3 1NF
Opening	7 June 1924
Owner	Ennismore
Design and construction
Developer	Caledonian Railway Company
Other information
Number of restaurants	4
Website
gleneagles.com

Gleneagles Hotel is a luxury hotel near Auchterarder, Perth and Kinross, Scotland.

The hotel, which opened in 1924, was built by the former Caledonian Railway Company and retains its own railway station.

During the Second World War, as with many large country hotels, it was converted into Gleneagles Hospital under the charge of Dr Thomas Ferguson as Medical Superintendent.

The hotel's golf course and luxurious surroundings meant that golf and grouse shooting at Gleneagles had, by the 1950s, become a fixed part of high society's calendar, along with yachting at Cowes and polo at Deauville.

When the hotel was being built, an up-and-coming dance band leader named Henry Hall was involved in buying their pianos, and organising the dance band entertainment. He decided that radio broadcasts would be an ideal way to advertise the new hotel, so was given permission to move his Trafford Band from Manchester's Midland Hotel to the Gleneagles and form a new band in Manchester. The hotel's opening night was celebrated with Scotland's first ever outside broadcast on June 4, 1924.

After the season ended, the band moved to the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool. Summer 1925 saw the band return to Gleneagles, although their commercial recordings were made in Manchester, and the winter seasons were in Liverpool.

Between 1982 and 1986, £11 million was spent on renovation and since 1982 the hotel has been open all year round. In 1986, and every year since, the hotel has been awarded five red stars by the AA. The hotel was owned for 31 years by the international alcoholic beverage firm Diageo, until it was sold to a private investment company Ennismore in 2015.