In 1865 the Midland Railway Company held a competition for the design of a 150-bed hotel to be constructed next to its railway station, St Pancras, which was still under construction at the time. Eleven designs were submitted, including one by George Gilbert Scott, which, at 300 rooms, was much bigger and more expensive than the original specifications. Despite this, the company liked his plans and construction began. Scott’s design was for a hotel with five floors below roof level but in the event it was built with four (which remains the case today) to save on construction costs – although the Midland Railway frequently reproduced Scott’s original impression, showing the hotel with its non-existent top floor, in its publicity material. The east wing opened on 5 May 1873, with the Midland Railway appointing Herr Etzensberger (formerly of the Victoria Hotel, Venice) as general manager. The hotel was completed in spring 1876.
The hotel was expensive, with costly fixtures including a grand staircase, rooms with gold leaf walls and a fireplace in every room. It had many innovative features such as hydraulic lifts, concrete floors, revolving doors and fireproof floor constructions, though none of the rooms had bathrooms, as was the convention of the time.
