Durban - The picture of old Durban this week takes in a beachfront institution, Durban’s Beach Hotel. The Beach Hotel was one of the first hotels built on what was then called Back Beach, later Ocean Beach, in the early 1900s, when all fashionable bathing was in the Bay.
Initially, a two-storey structure literally on the sand at the end of an extended West Street, the current building was erected after World War II.
The old picture was published in the Sunday Tribune on February 16, 1969, with the caption: “The Gooderson family have added the Beach Hotel, off sales and Beach Heights Holiday flats to their present ownership of the Lonsdale, International, Claridges, Cumberland and Killarney. The Beach has 400 beds, giving the group a total of 2 200. Mr RW Gooderson says that other acquisitions are planned.”
Famed for its Cockney Pride pub, the hotel was a key component in the family’s portfolio for another 50 years before being sold recently. It is believed it will to be used for student accommodation.
The hotel has had a fresh coat of paint recently as Shelley Kjonstad’s modern picture shows.
The Independent on Saturday