Corinthia Budapest

Built in 1896 for the Hungarian Millennium Exhibition, the nationwide celebration of a thousand years of Magyar statehood, the Corinthia has the scale and ambition of a building designed to make a statement to an entire country, and it shows no sign of having toned that ambition down since. The Royal Spa, set within the original turn-of-the-century swimming pool, remains the hotel's centrepiece: marble columns, a domed skylight, and water that has been drawing Budapest's society for well over a century. At over 400 rooms, it is one of the largest grand hotels in Central Europe, and one that wears its size with genuine grandeur rather than mere scale.