A gem of Swiss hotel history is being unveiled.
The Swiss Hotel Credit Society (SGH), based in Zurich and founded in 1966 as the successor to the Swiss Hotel Trust Company and the Swiss Guarantee Cooperative (HBG) for the seasonal hotel industry, has for decades held a treasure trove in its civil defence bunker that is unique in the history of the hotel industry: In 1943 and 1944, as part of the ‘Campaign for the Structural Renovation of Hotels and Health Resorts’, 830 hotels from various regions of Switzerland were systematically inventoried. In addition to detailed information on the building and the condition of the structure, the sanitary and electrical installations, operations, staff and market value, the inventory also includes current floor plans as well as exceptional interior and exterior photographs.
This collection offers a unique cross-section of the hotels in what were then the most important tourist destinations and enables researchers to conduct valuable comparative studies from the perspectives of architectural history, heritage conservation and social history.
In 2011, on the initiative of Dr Roland Flückiger-Seiler, then President of the Swiss Hotel Archive Foundation, the collection was catalogued and partially digitised, and transferred to the Swiss Economic Archives in Basel for permanent preservation. The Swiss Hotel Heritage Foundation continues this commitment to safeguarding and making historical collections accessible today.
Since then, this unique documentary has been available to the public free of charge.