The Grand

Could be an Australian pawnbroker I suppose? But it is in fact three of the lights which illuminate the driveway that sweeps majestically into The Grand...

The word Hotel used to follow on from that but a lot has happened since 1897. For fifty-three years, the hotel continued being just what it was built to do, but in 1950 it was converted into a teacher training college. Some years after that, it was subsumed into the Colchester Institute (yet another college) and became their halls of residence.

About ten years ago, it was sold to developers and neighbours feared it would be torn down. Instead, it was renovated to a high standard and converted to apartments, many with direct sea views.

It is Grade II listed now and has another claim to fame. For a long while architectural historians thought that the Ritz hotel in Picadilly was the earliest fully steel-framed brick building in this country. They now know that The Grand pre-dated the Ritz by five or six years.