The Dilly London, known for over a hundred years as The Piccadilly Hotel, is a historic 5-star

luxury hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suite (hotel), suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a d ...

located at 21

Piccadilly Piccadilly () is a road in the City of Westminster, London, England, to the south of Mayfair, between Hyde Park Corner in the west and Piccadilly Circus in the east. It is part of the A4 road (England), A4 road that connects central London to ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, England.

History

The hotel opened in 1908 as The Piccadilly Hotel. The building was designed by

Richard Norman Shaw Richard Norman Shaw RA (7 May 1831 – 17 November 1912), also known as Norman Shaw, was a British architect who worked from the 1870s to the 1900s, known for his country houses and for commercial buildings. He is considered to be among the g ...

, and it was the first portion of the great scheme for the rebuilding of

Piccadilly Circus Piccadilly Circus is a road junction and public space of London's West End of London, West End in the City of Westminster. It was built in 1819 to connect Regent Street with Piccadilly. In this context, a ''List of road junctions in the Unite ...

and the Quadrant of

Regent Street Regent Street is a major shopping street in the West End of London. It is named after George IV of the United Kingdom, George, the Prince Regent (later George IV) and was laid out under the direction of the architect John Nash (architect), J ...

to be realised. The hotel was bought by

Le Méridien Le Méridien is an American upscale, design-focused international hotel brand with a European perspective. It was originally founded by Air France in 1972 and was later based in the United Kingdom. Marriott International now owns the chain. As of ...

in 1986 and renamed Le Méridien Piccadilly. In 2010, Starman Hotels, a joint venture between

Starwood Capital Group Starwood Capital Group is an investment firm headquartered in Miami Beach, Florida. It is managed by Barry Sternlicht. It was co-founded by Sternlicht and Robert Faith in 1991. In 1993, Faith left Starwood to found Greystar Real Estate Partn ...

and

Lehman Brothers Lehman Brothers Inc. ( ) was an American global financial services firm founded in 1850. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States (behind Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Merril ...

, sold the hotel for £64 million to

Host Hotels & Resorts Host Hotels & Resorts, Inc., based in Bethesda, Maryland, is an American real estate investment trust that invests in hotels. As of December 31, 2023, the company owned 77 upscale hotels containing approximately 42,000 rooms in the United States, ...

, Dutch pension fund APG and Singaporean sovereign wealth fund

GIC GIC may refer to: Education * Ghana Insurance College, in Accra, Ghana * Government Intermediate College, a type of school in India * Grait International College in Nigeria * Gyosei International College in the U.K., defunct Finance * General ...

. In 2019, APG and GIC bought out Host's share, forming Archer Hotel Capital. The hotel left the Le Méridien division of the Marriott chain on 26 November 2020, and was renamed The Dilly London. In 2022, Archer Hotel Capital sold the hotel to Israel-based Fattal Hotels, which announced plans for a £90 million renovation to reposition the property as a luxury hotel. The hotel has a health club with an indoor swimming pool, steam room and massage facilities. It is also home to a dance studio where world-competitors practice, and two squash courts. One of the hotel's two restaurants is Terrace at The Dilly, a botanical oasis with views overlooking Piccadilly. In the 1930s, the hotel had a resident orchestra which broadcast on the radio and was led by

Sydney Kyte Sydney Bernard Kyte (born Solomon Barnett Chyte; 1 June 1896 – 29 July 1981) was a British dance band leader and violinist who became known in the 1930s, when he led the resident band at The Piccadilly Hotel in London's West End.Principal Proba ...

. They also appeared on commercial recordings, billed as Sydney Kyte and his Piccadilly Hotel Band. In 1969, the hotel hosted the first international symposium on gender identity, named "Aims, Functions and Clinical Problems of a Gender Identity Unit". Piccadilly Hotel 04

References

External links

* Hotels in the City of Westminster Buildings and structures on Piccadilly Hotel buildings completed in 1908 Hotels established in 1908 {{UK-hotel-struct-stub