Discover the history of a 5-star Grand Hotel with 140 years of tradition:

1834 The 5-star luxury hotel in Baden-Baden started life under the name of Stephanienbad. It was named in homage to Princess Stephanie of Baden, the adoptive daughter of Napoleon.
As the wife of Grand Duke Karl, she was also Baden's Lady of State from 1811 to 1818.

1857 The ownership of the house passed into the hands of French businessmen, triggering an influx of Parisian elegance to the property in the Lichtentaler Allee. The Parisian newspaper "Estafette" enthused about Baden-Baden as a Summer Paris. "Stéphanie les Bains" became a magnet for French society. The Franco-German war however put an abrupt end to this.

1872 A master tailor by the name of Anton Brenner purchased the 5-star hotel and the adjoining land at auction for his daughter and her husband, who had previously run the small Hotel Blume. However, with the death of his son-in-law in 1875, it appears that Anton Brenner ran the hotel himself and with great success too as is evident from the illustrious guest list. The spacious house was ideally suited to the aristocracy, who in those days always traveled with a large retinue.

1882 The house is written over to Camille Brenner, the son of Anton Brenner. It is with this gifted hotelier at the helm which sparked the hotel's rise to the status of a world-class Grand Hotel. Anton Brenner implied the same farsighted vision with which he purchased the property in the in Lichtentaler Allee, on his son by providing him with an excellent education. He also assured that his son became a man of the world by encouraging him to travel widely. A contemporary newspaper described Camille Brenner as: "Like a ruler, obsessed with the passions of collecting and building, he has created a hotel of a totally new dimension. He has lined it with carpets that are the envy and admiration of collectors, and furnished the luxurious apartments with the finest originals and antiques." Camille Brenner laid the groundwork for the modern 5-star superior Brenners Park-Hotel & Spa and his spirit is still omnipresent throughout the hotel today.

1900 Since 1895 extensive rebuilding work had taken place. The Villa Imperial, known today as the Villa Augusta, was developed and the neighboring Palais Stourdza was purchased adding the park, which reached as far as the River Oos. May 1900 saw the opening of the main building's new wing, signifying the start a new era in the hotel's history. Now with over 200 rooms, all furbished to offer the greatest in comfort, the Hotel Stephanie became the illustrious center of the state spa resort of Baden-Baden, which in itself was now one of the leading spa towns. The hotel's significance at this time is revealed on appraising the guest list. Prince Otto von Bismarck can be found along with the Grand Prince Michael of Russia, who regularly visited Baden-Baden, as indeed did so many Russian aristocrats. Also Edward Prince of Wales, later to be crowned King Edward VII, was a long-standing and regular guest.

One of the most impressive visitors was certainly the Maharaja of Kapurthala, who presented Camille Brenner with a portrait for the Guest Book. In 1907, King Chulalongkorn of Siam and Laos held court at the Hotel Stéphanie with his considerable retinue. However, it was not only the international aristocracy that frequented the house, but also artists of every genre and representatives of the major banks and great industrialists such as Henry Ford. The Americans were always in the majority among the international guests. Despite all of the public interest that surrounded the house, Camille Brenner always found a way to offer his famous guests an oasis of tranquility and recuperation.

1914 Camille Brenner died in Cannes. He left however no easy inheritance for his widow and five children. In 1912 he had bought the Hotel Minerva, but had run into difficulties with the authorities during the rebuilding process causing the development to have to be re-planned as a sanatorium. The break out of war saw the project came to an abrupt halt. Camille Brenner had borrowed a considerable amount for the building investment. Augusta Brenner and her son Kurt took over the hotel management. Kurt Brenner had enjoyed an excellent education, just like his father, and was ideally prepared for this assignment. Nevertheless, the hotel had to close at this point; not only because of the departure of the international guests, but also because the majority of the male staff had been called up for military service.

1920 Only in April 1920 had the post-war situation stabilized sufficiently to allow proper hotel operation. Although the regular pre-war international guests stayed away, the still famous hotel was soon full again.

1922 Augusta Brenner and her five children founded the Brenners Hotel Stock Corporation, primarily to facilitate inheritance. Kurt and Alfred Brenner followed in their father's footsteps and jointly managed the company. Exactly as their father would have wished, they enhanced the hotel complex, which in 1924, extended from the Bertholdstrasse to the Palais Gagarine.

1927 The year which can well be regarded as the zenith of early Brenners history. No other season saw so many reports in the world's press about famous visitors and interesting events. For the Brenner brothers the Twenties were literally the Golden Years. Almost 400 beds were available and some 500 employees attended to the wellbeing of the guests, of whom almost half were Americans.

1929 What had until this time been seen as a blessing, turned foul with the infamous Black Friday Stock Market crash putting the Hotel Stock Company into major difficulties. However, even if the Americans stayed away, the rooms did not remain empty. The Guest Book in 1930 lists such illustrious names as Franz Léhar and Richard Tauber, Wilhelm Furtwaengler and Professor Sauerbruch. Johann Strauss wrote in the Guest Book in May 1930: "As long as I have been coming to Baden-Baden, and that is for many years since the days of the hospitable Mr. Brenner, I have always been wonderfully cared for here. As an international traveler, I can assure you that one feels more comfortable within these walls than anywhere else."

1936 Due to the Casino in Baden-Baden reopening its doors in 1933, the number of international visitors also steadily rose. They now represented 63 percent of all guests. The names included celebrities such as Walt Disney, the Prince of Monaco and the Maharaja of Kapurthala with his son. At the height of this all too short upswing, Kurt and Alfred Brenner reached the incredible mark of 40,000 overnight guests in 1937.

1939 The Second World War hit Brenners in the middle of a flourishing period. Just a few days after the break out of war certain parts of the hotel had to be closed. The Hotel Stéphanie section of the complex had to remain closed for the entire duration of the war due to a lack of personnel.

1941 The Villa Stephanie and the Park-Hotel sections of the complex were able to be reopened with their 65 guest beds. In the same year, the Oetker Family, who had held shares in Brenners Hotel AG since 1922, became the majority shareholder.

1945 After the war, Brenners served briefly as the headquarters of the French Administration, but then had to be vacated for General Koenig and the Supreme Commander of the French Forces in Germany. The remaining buildings were also impounded.

1949 At the end of September the Park-Hotel in Baden-Baden was the first of the hotel buildings to be released. The General expressed his appreciation for the involuntarily granted hospitality with the order that the hotel should be restored and opened as quickly as possible. Still, it would be a long hard path for the Brenner Brothers until that time.

1950 On 1 April, the Park-Hotel once again re-opened its doors. Already in the first year, some 17,000 guests resided at the hotel, with almost half of these coming from abroad. The Park-Hotel regained the success of the past, albeit with only little more than a third of the hotel's pre-war bed capacity.

1955 It took another five years for the main complex to be handed back, but it had sustained such enormous damage that all efforts at restoration failed. In 1962 the decision was made to abandon the rescue work with the exception of the hotel wing built in 1900.