Milestones Icon: The Imperial Hotel

After its construction in 1881, the Imperial Hotel (then called the Zweck Hotel) was lauded by the Longmont Ledger as “the greatest stride that this promising town has made,” and it was dubbed “the finest building north of Denver,” by the Rocky Mountain News.

It was an expensive distinction. The building’s owner, George Zweck, was a Prussian immigrant who was lured to the area during the Pikes Peak gold rush of 1858. Zweck spent more than $50,000 – a small fortune at the time – to build the hotel, which he did without the use of any building plans.

Zweck outfitted the hotel with plush Belgian carpets, fine hardwood furniture, cut glass for the dining tables, and delicate Haviland china.

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Because Longmont still lacked a municipal water system at the time, water was hauled from the St. Vrain River and stored in three brick cisterns to provide guests with running water and flushing toilets. A coal stove was placed in every other room for heat. Zweck advertised it as “the only first-class hotel in Longmont.” The price for a room in these lavish lodgings? $2 a day.

When the 60-room hotel opened its doors, Longmont’s population stood at fewer than 1,000 people. But Zweck was sure that the town would prosper, and he was right. Unfortunately, Zweck did not.

The same year his hotel opened, a blizzard devastated Zweck’s ranching operation, and his most productive gold mine ran out soon after. Bankrupt, he was forced to sell the hotel to Charles Allen in 1894.

Allen renamed it the Imperial Hotel, and his family owned it for the next 53 years. Interestingly, it was from the Allen family that Zweck originally purchased the empty lots on which he built his luxury inn.

In 1971, the three-story Italianate-style building was purchased and remodeled. The upper levels are now residential lofts, while the ground floor houses the China Panda restaurant and the Java Stop coffee shop. Through a jungle of potted plants in what was once the hotel lobby, visitors can view a collection of black and white photos taken of the hotel during its heyday. One from 1895 shows the hotel with a row of Victorian chimneys lining the roof and a pressed tin corner piece trumpeting the 1880 construction start date. A horse and buggy waits under a tree below. Another picture shows early model automobiles parked in slanted spaces in front of the building, before the days of parallel parking. A still more recent image reveals that, at one time, the red brick exterior was covered by an elegant white façade.