Via Serlas 27, opened 29 July 1896 by Caspar Badrutt — second son of Johannes Badrutt, the man who invented the alpine winter season with a wager in 1864. He bought the Beau Rivage of 1872 and had the Zurich architects Chiodera and Tschudi turn it into a neo-Gothic castle of towers and terraces. The house has been in the same family for five generations and is the clearest case in this Library of serial early adoption as a hotel strategy.
The house
The list of firsts is the argument. Europe’s first indoor tennis courts and the region’s first ice rink in 1913. The Engadin’s first hotel lift and first telephone box in 1920. Bobsleigh, luge and skeleton all developed at St. Moritz to serve this clientele. In 1935 Hans Badrutt bought the Chesa Veglia farmhouse and turned it into a dance bar and restaurant — après-ski, invented in a barn. A gym and pool in 1969, when nobody said wellness.
Caspar died in 1904 at fifty-five and his son Hans ran it until 1953, through two wars and the Winter Olympics of 1928 and 1948. Then Helen and Andrea, then Andrea and Hansjürg. In 2006 Hansjürg and Anikó Badrutt, sole owners and childless, left two-thirds of the shares to Hans Wiedemann, who had become director in 2004 — the dynasty ending by bequest rather than by sale.
What distinguishes it
Five generations, and a first in almost every one. Electric light at the Kulm in 1878, indoor tennis in 1913, the lift and telephone in 1920, après-ski in 1935, a gym and pool in 1969, a heat-pump system in 2006. The Badrutt method is not tradition; it is buying the newest thing available and putting it in a mountain village.
Après-ski was invented in a farmhouse. Chesa Veglia, bought in 1935–36 and converted by Hans Badrutt into a dance bar, restaurant, bowling alley and live music. The category has a date and an address.
The sports were built for the guests. Bobsleigh, luge and skeleton developed at St. Moritz to entertain the clientele of these hotels. Three Olympic disciplines exist because a hotel needed its winter guests occupied.
The family ended it by giving it away. Childless and sole owners, Hansjürg and Anikó Badrutt bequeathed two-thirds to their director in 2006. No other house in this Library passed out of its founding family as a gift.
A widely repeated date is impossible. ⚑ Wikipedia states that Caspar Badrutt bought the Beau Rivage in 1864. Caspar was born on 21 July 1848 and would have been sixteen, and the Beau Rivage was built in 1872. Other accounts give 1883, 1884, the mid-1880s and 1892. The register carries the range and rejects 1864.
St. Moritz is a season and Badrutt’s is its centre: the house is at its fullest in high winter and its rhythm is social rather than restful. Jacket and tie are required in the main restaurant and public rooms after 7.30, and a guest who wants an informal mountain hotel will find the opposite of one.
Signature rooms and dates
Competitive landscape
Editorial note — The 29 July 1896 opening, Chiodera and Tschudi, the 1913 indoor tennis, the 1920 lift and telephone, Chesa Veglia in 1935–36, the 1969 gym and pool, Caspar’s death in 1904 and the 2006 bequest to Hans Wiedemann checked against Wikipedia, Swiss Historic Hotels, Falstaff, famoushotels.org and the hotel’s own brochure chronology; verified August 2026. ⚑ Wikipedia’s date of 1864 for Caspar’s purchase of the Beau Rivage is impossible — he was sixteen and the building did not exist until 1872. ⚑ Room counts are given as 112 rooms and 43 suites and as 163 and 47.
Sources
What the entry rests on. Each reference records the specific facts it supports, so a disputed line can be traced to the account it came from.