Juhász Gyula - Szántó András: Hotels - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1999)
In 1920, the complex was purchased by a bank, which established a cinema in place of the swimming pool and, in 1922, had the rest of the baths converted into a 160-room hotel called the Continental. Soon enough the popular hygienic bath and the tub bath department were also closed, and by 1929 all bathing- related services had been terminated, except that the medicinal water had been conducted to the hotel rooms. After the war the cinema was replaced by a theatre, which in its turn was converted into what was called the Tarka Színpad (the Parti-coloured Stage). This establishment functioned until 1963, while the hotel remained in use until 1970. After that the fine Art Nouveau building deteriorated rapidly. The huge glass domes, beautiful copper reliefs featuring bathing scenes, the ornamental column capitals and other decorative motifs dreamed up for the building of Hungária baths by its designers at the turn of the century survive only in faded, damaged traces. Whatever is now being prepared for, only the street front is salvageable at the most. The Hotel PANORÁMA, formerly the Hotel GOLF No. 21 Rege út, district XII In the late thirties, BSZKRT (Budapest Capital City Transport Co.) began to build a hotel on Széchenyi Hill, hoping that the project would increase tourism and, with it, the number of passengers using the Cogwheel Railway. Numerous architects objected that with its Historicist style, the building looked more like a medieval hunting mansion than a modern hotel. Today the establishment is one of the few hotels on Széchenyi Hill to have retained its original function to this day. The three-storey, 23-room facility was ceremonially inaugurated by mayor Károly Szendy in April 1939. In addition to its comfortable suites, the hotel had an indoor and an open-air restaurant at the disposal of its guests, who could also admire the peerless view afforded by the hotel’s look-out tower (the building stands on the top of the hill at a height of 455 metres). The hotel soon became popular not only with Budapest residents, but also with people from the provinces. In high season, the place was notoriously overbooked, so much so that even the cook’s room and the hairdresser’s workshop were often vacated to accommodate guests. If a story carried by the magazine Színházi 41
