Two family-run northside hotels reportedly set for a combined €70m sale

Enthused by the impending arrival of the railway in Malahide, a member of the British Parliament James Fagan built the Malahide Hotel in 1835. When it was granted a royal warrant he decided to call it the ‘Royal Hotel’ before it became the Grand in the early 1900s. The hotel has had plenty of colourful owners including Dr. John Fallon Sidney Colohan – who bought the Grand Hotel in 1910 for £10,000, and painted the hotel pink to celebrate his favourite drink, Pink Champagne, which he consumed daily. When the railway arrived in Malahide, The Grand Hotel offered special combined railway and hotel tickets, an inclusive fare of sixty-three shillings covering travel between Malahide and Dublin and lodgings at the Grand for a week. The First World War disrupted the Grand Hotel’s tourist business for a period of time as the hotel was chosen as the Irish headquarters for the British Army in the event of a German invasion. The Grand Hotel was modernised in the latter half of the 20th century, in the 60s owners Luke and Yvonne McCabe used the hotel grounds as a riding school.

Opened in 1897 and located at Sutton Cross, the Hotel was then known as the Golfers Hotel later becoming the Strand Hotel and finally in 1913 it assumed its name the Marine Hotel. It was one of the first businesses to have a telephone, its number being “Sutton 25”. The Gerarty sisters owned and managed the Hotel until 1959 when it was purchased by Oswald Johnson who built a seawater indoor swimming pool, a most unique feature at the time. The Ryan family took it over in 1989, adding a new swimming pool, new banquet room, restaurant, meeting rooms and an additional 25 bedrooms, in that time.