The Kandawgyi Palace Hotel was a five-star hotel and historical landmark overlooking the

Kandawgyi Lake Kandawgyi Lake ( my, ကန်တော်ကြီး ; literally "great royal lake", formerly Royal Lake), is one of two major lakes in Yangon, Burma (Myanmar). Located east of the Shwedagon Pagoda, the lake is artificial; water from Inya Lake ...

Yangon Yangon ( my, ရန်ကုန်; ; ), formerly spelled as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar (also known as Burma). Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

. The hotel caught fire on the morning of Thursday, 19 October 2017 and was destroyed.

History

The Kandawgyi Palace Hotel, built in 1934, started out as a two-story, red-brick building to house the Rangoon Rowing Club. It was a regular retreat for British officers who occupied British Burma at the time. It was then used by the Japanese as a welfare department during their occupation during World War II. After the war and when Burma had gained independence, the property became the National Biological Museum in 1948. The site first began operating as a hotel in 1979, when the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism took over. The hotel featured 10 bungalows made of teak. They were eventually replaced in 1993 by a larger lakeside building resembling traditional Southeast Asian architecture. The hotel was bought out by the

Htoo Group of Companies The Htoo Group of Companies (HGC) is a Burmese holding company, with headquarters at 5 Pyay Road, Hlaing Township, Yangon, Myanmar. HGC is the parent company of Air Bagan, a privately held Burmese airline company. The company has several subsidi ...

, which was founded by

Tay Za Tay Za (; my, တေဇ, ; also spelled Tayza or Teza; born 18 July 1964) is a Burmese business tycoon and the Chairman of Htoo Group of Companies, Myanmar. He is a close associate of the country's former head of state, Than Shwe. He is the firs ...

, a controversial Burmese

tycoon A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

who was closely linked to the country's former head of state,

Than Shwe Than Shwe ( my, သန်းရွှေ, ; born 2 February 1933 or 3 May 1935) is a Burmese strongman politician who was the head of state of Myanmar from 1992 to 2011 as Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). During this ...

Fire of 2017

At 3:15 in the morning of Thursday, 19 October, 2017, a devastating fire broke out. The cause was believed to have been an electrical fault. The fire was fed by gas canisters that burst from the boiler room. Eighty fire trucks were brought in to try to control the blaze, but the teak building was gutted. The hotel had 96 occupied rooms with a total of 141 guests. One man and a lady perished, a firefighter was treated for smoke inhalation, and a guest was treated after jumping from one of the hotel's upper windows.

References

{{reflist Buildings and structures in Yangon Resorts in Myanmar Hotels in Myanmar The Leading Hotels of the World Hotel buildings completed in 1934 Defunct hotels 1934 establishments in Burma