Mark Hopkins Hotel

The InterContinental Mark Hopkins San Francisco is a luxury hotel located at the top of Nob Hill in San Francisco, California. The hotel is owned by the InterContinental Hotels Group. The chain operates over 200 hotels and resorts in approximately 75 nations.

The 19th floor penthouse suite of was converted into the glass-walled Top of the Mark restaurant cocktail lounge.

History

Mark Hopkins, one of the founders of the Central Pacific Railroad, chose the southeastern peak of Nob Hill as the site for a dream home for his wife, Mary. The mansion was completed in 1878, after his death.

Mary Sherwood Hopkins at the age of seventy-three, on her death in 1891, left the Nob Hill mansion and a $70-million estate to her second husband, Edward Francis Searles. In 1893, Searles donated the building and grounds to the San Francisco Art Association (now San Francisco Art Institute), for use as a school and museum.

The Mark Hopkins mansion survived the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, however, it was destroyed in the three-day fire that followed the earthquake.

Mining engineer and hotel investor George D. Smith purchased the Nob Hill site, removed the Art Association building, and began construction of a luxury hotel. The San Francisco architectural firm Weeks and Day designed the 19-story hotel, a combination of French château and Spanish ornamentation.

One of the banquet areas, "The Room of The Dons", contains a piece of California...
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