Eichardt's Hotel

History

William Gilbert Rees, an early European settler in the Queenstown area, first arrived at Lake Wakatipu in 1859 looking for grazing land. He constructed a large hotel on what is now Frankton Road, a lakefront homestead, and a woolshed on the spot where Eichardt's Private Hotel now stands. When gold was found in the Shotover River in 1862, Rees's high country station became the focus of a gold rush. His homestead was designated an official goldfield, and Queenstown's main business district grew up around his station.

Rees moved into the hotel business, adding a wooden front to his woolshed and turning it into a hotel called the Queen's Arms. In early 1866, Rees went into partnership with Albert Eichardt, who became the hotel's sole owner by 1869. Eichardt changed the name to Eichardt's Queen's Arms Hotel, and later to Eichardt's Hotel. The building suffered major damage in the Queenstown floods of November 1999.

After the floods, the owners carried out renovations to restore the structure and transform it into a luxury boutique hotel. It reopened as Eichardt's Private Hotel in December 2001. Now owned by Andrew and Sarah Cox of Melbourne, the property belongs to Small Luxury Hotels of the World and the Virtuoso network, and has been recommended by Andrew Harper's Hideaway Report since 2002.