Hotel National, Moscow

Hotel National, Moscow
General information
Location	Moscow, Russia
Opening	January 14, 1903
Management	Starwood Hotels & Resorts
Design and construction
Architect	Alexander Ivanov
Other information
Number of rooms	202
Number of suites	56
Number of restaurants	2
Website
Hotel National, Moscow

The Hotel National, Moscow (Russian: гости́ница «Националь») is a five-star hotel in Moscow, Russia, opened in 1903. It has 202 bedrooms and 56 suites and is located on Manege Square, directly across from The Kremlin. The hotel is managed by The Luxury Collection, a division of Starwood Hotels & Resorts.

The National was financed by The Varvarinskoe Joint-Stock Company of Householders and designed by architect Alexander Ivanov. Construction began in 1901 and the 160-room hotel opened on January 14, 1903. The hotel's opening is sometimes listed as January 1, because Russia was still using the Julian calendar at the time, which was 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar used in the rest of the world. In 1915 the hotel made plans to add two floors on top of the six-story structure, but shortages caused by World War I meant that the work was never begun.

In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution, the capital of Russia was moved to Moscow. In March 1918, the hotel became the home of the first Soviet government. As the Kremlin had been damaged during fighting in October 1917 and was under repair, Lenin made his home in room 107 at the Hotel National with his wife for seven days. The hotel is today marked with a plaque noting this event. The hotel also accommodated other Soviet leaders, including Trotsky and secret police chief Felix Dzerzhinsky. The building continued to be used by the Soviet government afterwards as a hostel for official party delegates, and was renamed First House of Soviets in 1919.

By 1931 the building was in need of repair and was given a complete renovation to house foreign visitors. It was redecorated with museum-quality furniture and antiques from the palaces of the Tsars and Russian nobility, including Tsarskoye Selo and the Anichkov Palace. The pieces remain in the hotel's collection to this day. The huge mosaic on the hotel's upper corner was replaced with a 120-square meter socialist realist artwork focusing on the industrial might of the Soviet economy. The National reopened under its original name in 1932. The hotel joined Intourist, the state-run tourism monopoly, in 1933.

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