Luxurious Grand Sofar Hotel Opens To Public In Lebanon
Sofar Grand Hotel in the Lebanese village of Sofar is some 30 kilometres (20 miles) east of the capital, Beirut. Inside the abandoned century-old hotel, paintings of the Arab world's once powerful and famous hang around a worn poker table, testimony to its glamourous past before the civil war.
Built in 1892 under Ottoman rule by Lebanon's wealthy Sursock family, the forgotten hotel was hub to Arab diplomats, French and British officers and also Egyptian film stars who all flocked before the 1975-1990 conflict forced it to close down.
This month, the hotel opened its doors to the public for the first time in decades to exhibit dozens of works celebrating the hotel's past by British artist Tom Young.
