Grand Hotel Savoia Cortina
OUR HISTORY

The Grand Hotel Savoia was born in 1912, when this part of Italy belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and its fortunes and history have followed that of the town. Cortina has been an adventure sport hub since the 1860s, when mountain climbers started mapping out the Dolomites, and by the turn of the 19th century it had become a summer holiday rendezvous for British, Austrian and Germany high society, drawn by the sublime landscape and clean air. Between the wars, it started gaining a reputation as a swish winter destination, which picked up again in the 1950s when names such as Audrey Hepburn, Frank Sinatra and Ernest Hemingway all visited the town, along with Brigitte Bardot. Cortina encapsulated mid-century glamour, where fashion, film and sport met for aprés-ski cocktails. This popularity reached its height in 1956 when Cortina hosted the Winter Olympics, opened by Sophia Loren, and was later star of the show as a snowy location in films including The Pink Panther (1963), Von Ryan’s Express (1965) and 007’s For Your Eyes Only (1981).

Since opening, Grand Hotel Savoia has been a central part of Cortina’s social fabric. Just like the subject of Wes Anderson’s 2014 film Grand Hotel Budapest, we have many stories to tell – names who have signed the guest book include Tolstoy, Roosevelt, Umberto di Savoia and Churchill, along with Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren herself. And while being one of Cortina’s grande-dame hotels, we’ve moved with the times. In 2009 the hotel reopened after major restructuring work, allowing it to continue as one of the town’s key addresses – as much loved and appreciated by locals and Italian visitors as those from overseas. Now part of the Radisson Collection family, and recently refurbished, Grand Hotel Savoie continues to help make history – a glamorous, characterful home-from-home with all the best views.