Hotel del Coronado

The Hotel del Coronado, at 1500 Orange Avenue on Coronado Island, California, opened in February 1888 and is one of the largest surviving wooden Victorian beach resorts in the United States. Developers Elisha Babcock and Hampton Story set out to build the largest resort in the world on the sandy peninsula across the bay from San Diego, and they hired architects James and Merritt Reid to design it. Construction took only about a year, and the hotel was among the first buildings in the country to be lit by Thomas Edison's electric light. Its Queen Anne and Victorian styling includes a red turreted roof, a wooden lobby with a spiral staircase and a courtyard garden at the center. The Crown Room, a large ballroom with a ceiling made of sugar pine fitted without nails, remains a showpiece. Over its history the hotel has hosted presidents including Benjamin Harrison, Franklin Roosevelt and Barack Obama, and it is associated with legends such as the visit of the Prince of Wales in 1920 and the 1958 film Some Like It Hot, shot on site with Marilyn Monroe. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1977. Restoration and renovation have been continuous, with major projects in the 20th and 21st centuries to repair the wood structure, update building systems, and preserve historic rooms. Public areas can be visited free, including the lobby, the history gallery in the lower level, the grounds and the beach in front, though access to guest areas is restricted. The museum-like display covers the building's construction and the stories of its guests, and the interpretation is thematic. The hotel is reached by the Coronado Bridge, ferry or bus, and the nearby town offers shops and restaurants. Visitors who stay overnight experience the hotel as a working historic property.