Grove Park Inn

The Grove Park Inn opened in Asheville in July 1913, less than a year after construction began. The speed was part of the design. Edwin Wiley Grove wanted a mountain resort that would attract visitors to Asheville, and his son-in-law, Fred Seely, drew plans for a hotel built from granite quarried on Sunset Mountain above the site.

Workers moved tons of stone down the slope with mules, wagons, ropes, pulleys, and a steam shovel. Many of the masons were Italian immigrants. The inn’s massive fireplaces and rough-hewn walls made the building feel rooted in the mountain, while its Arts and Crafts furnishings rejected the delicate, machine-made look of the Victorian era. Grove and Seely had studied resort hotels in the West, including Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Inn, and adapted that lodge-like scale for Asheville.