Hotel Römischer Kaiser

It was designed by Josef Kleesattel and finished in 1904.

Hotel Römischer Kaiser
General information
Type	offices, commercial, former hotel
Architectural style	Heimatstil
Location	Stresemanstraße 26, Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
Coordinates	51°13′09″N 6°47′7″E / 51.21917°N 6.78528°E / 51.21917; 6.78528
Completed	1904
Design and construction
Architect(s)	Josef Kleesattel

 

The previous building of the hotel was at Benrather Straße 3. From 1903 to 1904 Josef Kleesattel built the four-story corner structure with stone facades at the corner of Steinstraße 70 (today Stresemannstraße 26). The building contractor was FW Zensen. Hermann vom Endt designed the beer and wine bars that were connected to the hotel. Its location was touted on advertisements as being only five minutes away from Düsseldorf's main train station, and was equipped with all the modern conveniences of the time, including electric lights, an elevator, and central heating. The Düsseldorf Yacht Club was founded on the hotel's premises in 1908.

Jörg Heimeshoff has described the Gothic revival details as such:

The facades of the building erected as the Römischer Kaiser hotel show decorative elements from the late Gothic period. Tracery structures on parapets, balconies and windows, curtain arches and stone cross windows indicate this. Several bay windows, balconies, gables and turrets create a picturesque appearance. Wide, segment-arched openings divide the ground floor.

However, one might argue that the combination of Gothic-revival elements with bulbous domes capping the corner tower and the gables with volutes point more to a Heimatstil (Homeland style) popular in German architecture around 1900.

The building was damaged during World War II and rebuilt in a simplified manner in the 1950s. The gables and turret were reconstructed in 1982-83 largely based on the original drawings, though the small dormers in between these features were left as skylights. It is currently used as a bank office on the ground floor (since 2015), with offices on the upper floors.

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  Dining Room, ca. 1904
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  Photograph of the façade, ca. 1904
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  Detail of corner tower, 2012
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  Detail of oriel bay, 2012
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  Sculptural detail on façade
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  Sculptural detail on façade
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  Sculptural detail on façade