Author Amor Towles visited Moscow in 1998. At that point, the Metropol Hotel was nearly celebrating its 100th anniversary. Opening in 1905, it joined the ranks of other leading grand hotels of its era like the Waldorf Astoria in New York, Claridge’s in London, and the Ritz in Paris. All of these hotel siblings shared similar characteristics for luxury and service. You could travel from one to the other and feel at home.
The Metropol was the first hotel in Moscow to have hot water and telephones in the rooms, international cuisine in the restaurants, and an American bar off the lobby. Stomping grounds for the internationally rich and famous and the elite of the city, the Metropol was at the heart of Moscow, situated on Theatre Square and across from the Kremlin.
