Hotel Britânia

A standout design by modernist architect Cassiano Branco from the 1940s, the Britânia is the only hotel building from that period that has survived intact to the modern day. Restored in accordance with its original Art Deco style, the hotel’s distinctiveness led to it being listed as a Lisbon historic building. When it opened on 13 October 1944, it was called Hotel do Império and it soon became a favourite haunt for high society, politicians and intellectuals. In 1950 the poet Natália Correia married the hotel owner and manager and moved into the building next door, with the hotel becoming a natural extension of her literary salons attended by Portuguese artists and writers such as David Mourão-Ferreira, Almada Negreiros and Mário Cesariny, as well as international authors such as Marguerite Yourcenar, Henry Miller and Graham Greene.