Salle des Fêtes
Owned by a Parisian company, the Splendide took over from another large luxury establishment, the Grand Hotel de Russie et d'Angleterre, built at the end of the 19th century. The Hotel Splendide benefited from major renovation work in 1918-1919. It then has 200 rooms with bathroom or toilet, a restaurant and a private garage for 40 cars with its own automobile repair shop. The hotel had richly decorated rooms with a very famous restaurant. Customers benefited from a billiard room, a reading room, a party room, a smoking room, a winter garden, and a bar.
In August 1940, it was at Le Splendide that the journalist Varian Fry, who came from the United States, will settle, mandated in secret by the American association of the Emergency Rescue Committee whose goal is to allow the escape of people in danger, mainly Jewish or anti-Nazi intellectuals and artists.
He arrives in Marseilles with 3 dollars, a small suitcase and a list of some two hundred writers and artists in danger. From Marseilles, he thus saved between 000 and 2 Jews and anti-Nazi militants by helping them to flee Europe and the Vichy regime. He received only belated recognition from France shortly before his death.
After the occupation of Marseille in November 1943, the hotel was used by the German authorities as a meeting place and to house staff officers. On January 3, 1943, shortly before 20 p.m., he was attacked by an FTP-MOI group.
Explosive devices thrown from outside by Hélène Taich left several injured and two dead, a French butler and the wife of an attaché of the German consulate general. A few minutes later, another group led by Lev Tchernine blew up a brothel reserved for occupying troops in Rue Lemaitre. The next day, a state of siege was declared by General Mylo, commander of the Place de Marseille. These two attacks will serve as a pretext for the occupying forces and their French allies to justify the roundup of January 22, 23 and 24, 1943 and the destruction of the northern districts of the Old Port.
Le Splendide became a hotel again after the war until the 1970s. The building is now occupied by the Regional Center for Educational Documentation of the Aix-Marseille Academy
The building
It is made up of two rectangular buildings, covered in terraces, separated by a courtyard occupied on the ground by volumes on the ground floor, covered with glass roofs. The two bodies of the building are connected on all floors by a wing of superimposed galleries. The two main buildings are covered in terraces. The two main elevations are in whitewashed freestone. The gallery wing is made up of a structure of metal posts and beams, lined with bricks. The main body of the building, on the boulevard d'Athènes, rises 5 square floors above a basement and the ground floor. The front facade is punctuated by 13 bays of windows (1st floor) or French windows opening onto small balconies or balconies overlooking three bays. The attic floor is a gallery, with twin Tuscan columns supporting a molded cornice.
The ground floor is pierced with large bay windows. The main entrance is sheltered by a wrought iron canopy. The back facade, on rue des Dominicaines, is treated with the same care.
The building on rue François-Bazin rises 3 square floors and an attic floor, on the ground floor. On the ground floor, the southeast corner, overlooking the boulevard d'Athènes and the rue des Dominicaines, is occupied by the hall, the reception and the restaurant. The northern part, crossing between the boulevard d'Athènes and the rue François-Bazin, houses several salons. The L-shaped space to the south-west is reserved for administration (management, secretariat, accounts), the kitchen, storage areas (crockery, fruit store, cold room) and the staff canteens. Access to the floors is via a main winding staircase, with returns around a day, secondary staircases and two elevators. The floors of the eastern building are divided into suites which all overlook the boulevard or the rue des Dominicaines. In the western building, which has not been visited, there were simpler rooms.
The cast iron fireplace in the reading room is signed P. Martin. The painted decorations of the reading room are signed by the painter Claude Camark and dated 1992. The exterior decoration is very sober. It is limited to the ground floor punctuated by pilasters in low relief decorated in the upper part with medallions surmounted by garlands of plants. We find this medallion at the top of the south facade. The main entrance is confined by two Tuscan columns. It is sheltered by a wrought iron canopy decorated with scrolls and Greek. The railings of the balconies and the main staircase are also made of ornamental ironwork. The floors in the lounges are cement ceramic tiles with geometric patterns. In the reading room, panels on the walls are painted with modern stylized floral designs.
