Retro: Most glamorous place to stay in city is now in sorry state

Today Sheffield’s famed Hallam Tower Hotel is in a sorry state.

But in its heyday star guests flocked there. Many regret the fact that it is now an abandoned eyesore and a magnet for graffiti artists and urban explorers.

The glory days of the once famous building were between 1965 and 2004, when the hotel was in full swing.

Construction on the towering Fulwood building began in 1963 and, for several decades, it welcomed a string of star guests, including the Brazilian ace, who stayed there in the early 1970s.

The hotel was one of the first such venues built since the end of the Second World War, constructed at a lofty price for the time of £1 million.

The grand edifice once boasted 136 bedrooms over 11 floors with more than 150 staff working across the hotel, which covered a three-and-a- half-acre site.

After its construction the city and the building’s owners were keen to capitalise on the hotel’s modern look and it appeared in an advertisement for the Ford Galaxie 500 and in the promotional film; Sheffield… City on the Move, which later resurfaced in the opening of The Full Monty.

Several times during the 1960s the hotel restaurant appeared in Egon Ronay’s Guide to British Eateries and achieved a four star rating from the AA. For the 1966 World Cup, Hillsborough Stadium was the ‘home’ ground of the Swiss team and their over night accommodation was the Hallam Tower Hotel.

One incident that was said to have happened at the time was when the Swiss national side fielded a team which left out two of their star players, against Germany, due to those players arriving back at the hotel an hour after curfew the night before.

In 1978 the Hallam aimed for a more prestigious market.

Hotels management decided it wanted a better dressed client and would only accept bookings from rock bands as long as they were dressed appropriately inside the hotel and didn’t swear while in the hotel restaurant.

By 1986, the building had changed to the Hallam Tower Post House Hotel, with a £750,000 refurbishment. Its new gym suite was opened in 1987 by Sheffield Wednesday manager Howard Wilkinson and boxer Herol Graham.

In various other guises, the hotel became Forte Crest Sheffield, Posthouse Sheffield and in 2001, Holiday Inn Sheffield West.

The hotel eventually closed, along with the attached Spirit Health Club, on April 18, 2004, and the building sold for more than £6 million. Since then, various redevelopment proposals to turn it into residential accommodation have been mooted, but none became a reality. In 2015, The Star reported the building would be demolished for a set of luxury apartments costing £300,000 each, as well as £495,000 homes you can design yourself.

As reported in the Star – The tower was damaged in a fire during the evening of January 10, 2016.

The report said: Firefighters dealt with a blaze at the derelict former Hallam Tower Hotel.

Three fire engines and a turntable ladder were called to the empty building on Manchester Road, Broomhill, at about 5pm. A fire involving a small amount of wood’ broke out on the seventh floor. Crews extinguished the fire and left at about 6.20pm.