Tall Storey - The Arrecife Gran Hotel in Lanzarote
There are many good quality hotels in Lanzarote. As you´d expect from a holiday island that attracts over 1.5 million tourists annually. But one in particular stands – quite literally - head and shoulders above the competition. As the Gran Hotel in Arrecife is the only high rise building on the island. Granting incredible views down to the capital of Arrecife below.
Thanks to an island born artist and architect called Cesar Manrique high rise construction was outlawed on Lanzarote during the 1970´s. In order to ensure that the island didn’t suffer the same fate as the Spanish Costas – which were being submerged beneath a sea of hotels as tourism took off in Spain under the aegis of General Franco.
Manrique however urged a more restrained approach on the island of his birth – and thanks to the fact that he had friends in high places in the form of then island governor Pepin Ramirez Lanzarote today still remains largely unspoilt. With advertising hoardings also banned and the island’s main holiday resorts all well contained.
The shell of what is today the Arrecife Gran Hotel was sneaked up by developers whilst Manrique was off the island during 1988 – but on his return the project was soon halted. As it clearly contravened his edict that any building should be no taller than the height of a Canarian palm tree.
As a result the concrete shell stood empty and derelict for many years. And was even the victim of a fire back in 1990. But the cost of demolishing the edifice was so prohibitive that the island government eventually decided to hand the building over to a property developer. And granted permission for the construction of a five star hotel on the site.
As a result the Arrecife Gran opened its doors for business after a €26 million renovation in June 2004. Boasting seventeen floors, a roof top restaurant called the Altamar, 52 double rooms and 104 suites. Along with a Spa Centre, swimming pool and direct access to the city beach at Playa El Reducto. Making the Arrecife Gran an attractive alternative to other accommodation options such as apartments or villas in Lanzarote.
Further improvements to the environs of the hotel are also afoot – as the island government forges ahead with plans to create a lido swimming area, with bars, restaurants and shops to a plan drawn up by Manrique at the nearby Islote de Fermin. A project very similar in style to the extremely successful Parque Marítimo de Santa Cruz on the fellow Canary Island of Tenerife.
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Posted January 29, 2009
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