History

In the absence of a major first-class hotel in the country, the Constitutional Congress of the Republic of Costa Rica enacted law number 34 on November 22, 1928, which was actually a contract subscribed on October 3, 1928, by and between the first owner of the hotel, Dr. Luis Paulino Jiménez Ortiz, and Cleto González Víquez, President of the Republic. It granted a series of fiscal benefits to the contractor, in exchange for the construction of the hotel. There was also a provision according to which the Government was granted for twenty years the right to have at their disposal for free two apartments at the hotel for lodging foreign diplomatic representatives of extraordinary nature. The contract further agreed to always serve top-quality Costa Rican coffee at the hotel. The agreement was complied in 1930 with the opening of the Grand Hotel Costa Rica, with a majestic five-story building located in front of the square, where the statue of the first Costa Rican President, Juan Mora Fernández, is displayed, and diagonal to the superb 1897 Palace that holds the National Theater, an example of beautiful neoclassic architecture.

On December 7th, 2004, the Gran Hotel Costa Rica was declared by the President of the country Abel Pacheco a historical-architectural landmark of Costa Rica, not only for being the first major hotel of the country, but also for its long trajectory, its architecture, which represents the San José of those years, and the historical complex it forms with other landmarks in the area.