From Luxury Listings NYC: It’s the end of an era for London’s miserably oppressive US embassy.
According to The Guardian, the Qatari royal family’s property company, Qatari Diar, has been given the go-ahead to turn the building into a luxury hotel.
The Grade II-listed building, in Mayfair’s very up-market Grosvenor Square, has nine floors, three of which are underground, and will house up to 137 hotel rooms, plus shops, restaurants and bars. Before it was made a listed building — which would have lowered its worth due to development restrictions — the embassy was reportedly valued at £500 million ($621 million). [more]