Macdonald Randolph Hotel

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The Macdonald Randolph Hotel (locally often simply called "The Randolph") is the leading hotel in Oxford, England. It is centrally located on the south side of Beaumont Street, on the corner with Magdalen Street, opposite the Ashmolean Museum and close to the Oxford Playhouse.

The hotel is Victorian Gothic in style. It featured in the Inspector Morse television series several times.

It is only relatively recently that the hotel has been officially renamed the Macdonald Randolph Hotel from the former shorter name of the simily Randolph Hotel.

[edit] History

The Randolph Hotel was built in 1864 by the architect William Wilkinson, who also designed many residences in North Oxford. There was debate about the building's design. John Ruskin favoured Gothic revival like the nearby Martyrs' Memorial. The City Council wanted a classical style since the rest of Beaumont Street was Georgian. A compromise was attained with a simplified Gothic facade, similar to the Oxford University Museum and the Oxford Union buildings, but in brick.

The hotel was not named after Randolph Churchill, (who was connected with Blenheim Palace to the north of Oxford). Rather it was because it was near to the Randolph Gallery in the new Ashmolean Museum opposite. The gallery was built as a result of a thousand pound gift left by Dr Francis Randolph, the former Principal of St Alban's Hall, part of Merton College from 1882, who died in 1796.

Major refurbishments of the hotel were undertaken in 1952, 1978, 1988 and 2000.