History
In the year 1893, Pierre Pont (1831-1937)started to built the Grand Hôtel in Chandolin - Les Dailettes Builders from the Aosta-Valley helped him. Donkeys carried the material from the valley up to the building site at 2000 metres altitude. In 1897 the house was opened and created the first tourism in Chandolin. Because they had no proper heating the house couldn’t be used for the whole year.
Pierre Pont managed the house until 1937 (he was 106 years old!!!). He was followed by his son Marc, who installed the first proper heating in the house. Because of health reasons Marc Pont gave the Hotel in 1971 to the third owner, a group of investors from the Wallis.
Badly in debt the group gave the Hotel to Pierre-Philippe Ruedin, an architect from Geneva. He renovated the house between 1976 and 1987, and rented it to Intersoc, the holiday service of a big health insurance. They used it as holiday group accommodation.
After that Mr Ruedin sold the house to the CIA, a pensionin company from Geneva. After divorcing, Mrs Ruedin brought the house back with the help of a Bank from Geneva. For a short period the house was used for cultural events. Soon after it felt back to the Bank UBS AG.
In the year 2001 the company "Grand HôteI de Chandolin SA" was founded. Investors built up from Germany and Switzerland, which are bounded with the place Chandolin. They brought the house and renovated it ,since this time they have used it as a group accommodation.
The house has a long history. Famous visitors like the German chancellor Konrad Adenauer, Großadmiral Alfred Freiherr von Tirpitz, Ferdinand von Zeppelin, Paul Hindemithand the painter Edouard Ravel (Uncle of the famous composer Maurice Ravel).
Especially Adenauer and Ravel were pleased by the hotel they visited the place many times. Some of Ravels paintings were painted here and are exhibited in the hotel
(Bilder auf der rechten Seite mit freundlicher Genehmigung der Stiftung Bundeskanzler-Adenauer-Haus, Rhöndorf)
