14 hotels where historically significant meetings have happened

23.07.2024 - 18:42 / thepointsguy.com / Lake Geneva / Grace Kelly

Holding meetings and events at posh hotels isn't a new concept; some of the toniest hotels in the world have served as backdrops to some of the most important gatherings in history. Whether it's for negotiating peace, creating bodies of diplomacy or hosting heads of state — or certain A-list pop music chanteuses — these are some of our favorite hotels in the world with an important claim to history-making meetings.

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Consider this luxe getaway a palace of diplomacy. Switzerland's Beau-Rivage Palace on the shores of Lake Geneva opened in 1861. Since then, the luxury hotel has been the backdrop to a variety of peace talks resulting in agreements such as the Treaty of Lausanne (the final peace document to conclude World War I) and the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, from which the U.S. withdrew in 2018.

If you're one who chases high thread count over peace talks, have no fear: Beau-Rivage Palace is a traveler favorite for its manicured gardens fit for an alfresco meal, highly attentive service and tasteful rooms and suites (splurge on one with either a lake or Alps view).

A hotel meeting with one of the biggest impacts on U.S. aviation and discount airfare took place at San Antonio's The St. Anthony, a Luxury Collection Hotel. It was at the hotel's St. Anthony Club where Southwest Airlines cofounders Rollin King and Herb Kelleher — who had imbibed just a smidge, the story goes — mapped out the business plan for their future airline on a cocktail napkin. The rest is aviation history.

Guests checking into this downtown San Antonio hotel where Old Hollywood and Old Texas meet — everyone from John Wayne and Grace Kelly to the late President George H.W. Bush have stayed here — have far more awaiting them than Marriott Bonvoy points. Downstairs, public areas are dotted with French antiques and fine art while guest rooms and suites are clean, comfortable, and — if you pick the right one — overlook the city's Travis Park. Don't miss cocktails at the speakeasy-inspired St. Anthony Club, and drinks at the rooftop pool are a great way to bask in the sun while coming up with your own business plan on a napkin.

Author Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote far more than "The Scarlet Letter." For starters, he penned of Washington D.C.'s Willard Hotel (today known as the Willard InterContinental) that "Willard's Hotel could more justly be called the center of Washington and the Union than either the Capitol, the White House, or the State Department. ... You are mixed up here with office seekers, wire pullers, inventors, artists, poets, editors, Army correspondents, attaches of foreign journals, long-winded talkers, clerks, diplomatists, mail contractors, railway directors—until