The Grand Hotel Pupp inspired Wes Anderson, who loosely based his 2014 film The Grand Budapest Hotel on the legendary neo-Baroque lodging (though the filmmaker credits another Karlovy Vary hotel, the Bristol, with his fictional hotel’s pink facade).
No stranger to the international film scene, the Pupp stood in for a Montenegro casino in 2006’s Casino Royal, the first Bond film to feature Daniel Craig as the M16 agent; it also hosts the annual Karlovy Vary Film Festival.
The 228-room luxury hotel is one of the oldest in Europe, and a celebrity in it owns right with a history stretching back to 1701 when it first opened as Saxony Hall.
Later, in an Andersonian twist, it was acquired by confectioner Jan Jiří Pop who married into ownership in 1775, giving it the German variant of his name “Pupp.”
Following the war, the Communist government of Czechoslovakia nationalized the hotel. It was renamed Grandhotel Moskva in 1950. The hotel’s original name was restored in 1989 and it has since been privatized.
As of this week, the property has a new owner, GHPCZ Invest Limited, who will oversee its repair and reconstruction—the hotel bar (Becher’s Bar) will re-open later this month after a makeover.
Below, a peek at the eminent Carlsbad Grand Hotel Pupp, and if you haven’t visted the West Bohemian spa town of Karlovy Vary, the 52nd Karlovy Vary Film Festival begins on June 30—though some say it’s best to go when the fanfare is over.