1902 Spanish Renaissance Grand Hotel in the White Mountains
310 Mt. Washington Hotel Road, Bretton Woods, NH 03575
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$$
Standard rooms typically $300-$600+ per night depending on season; suites and Princess Carolyn Suite (Room 314) priced higher and frequently booked far in advance.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Paved
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1902 · National Historic Landmark · Bretton Woods Conference 1944 · Gilded Age Resort Architecture
Joseph Stickney commissioned architect Charles Alling Gifford to design the Mount Washington Hotel in 1900. Two hundred fifty Italian artisans were imported to complete the Spanish Renaissance structure, and at its July 28, 1902 opening it stood as one of the largest and most technologically advanced wooden buildings in New England. Stickney installed steam heat, hot and cold running water, electric lights, and an early private telephone system at a final cost of approximately $1.7 million.
Stickney died in late 1903, only a year after his hotel opened. His widow, Carolyn Foster Stickney, continued to summer at the property and retained ownership. In 1908 she married a French nobleman, Prince Jean Baptiste Marie de Faucigny-Lucinge, becoming Princess Carolyn. She returned to the hotel each summer until her death in 1936, occupying the same suite — Room 314, today called the Princess Suite.
In July 1944, the hotel hosted the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, an event remembered as the Bretton Woods Conference. Delegates from forty-four nations met in the Gold Room and surrounding parlors and ratified the Bretton Woods Agreement, which created the International Monetary Fund and the precursor to the World Bank and pegged global currencies to the U.S. dollar.
The resort was added to the National Register of Historic Places and designated a National Historic Landmark in 1986. After several ownership changes through the late twentieth century, Omni Hotels & Resorts acquired the property in 2015. Today the resort operates year-round as a 200-room luxury hotel with a 25,000-square-foot spa, an 18-hole golf course, and ski terrain at adjacent Bretton Woods Mountain Resort.
Sources
Most of the resort's reported activity is anchored to Room 314, known on the property as the Princess Suite. Carolyn Stickney Faucigny-Lucinge occupied the suite each summer from her husband Joseph Stickney's death in 1903 until her own death in 1936. Guests have reported seeing the figure of a woman in period dress sitting at the foot of the canopy bed, sometimes brushing her hair at the vanity. Housekeepers and front-desk staff have described lights and the bedside lamp turning on and off without intervention, and small belongings — earrings, a hairbrush, a pair of gloves — relocating between the bedroom and the sitting area.
Reports also cluster in the hotel's two corner towers, which were once part of Carolyn's private quarters. Overnight engineering staff have described the sound of footsteps on empty stair landings and the impression of being watched while moving through service corridors. Several accounts describe a residual scent of rosewater in the upper-floor hallway leading to 314.
The Syfy network's Ghost Hunters team investigated the resort in 2008 (Season 4, Episode 7). The team focused on Room 314 and the towers and recorded what they characterized as an unexplained voice and a moving shadow during their overnight session. The episode aired in the fall of that year and reinforced the property's place in regional paranormal tourism.
Resort staff treat the lore lightly. The historic tour points out Room 314 from the hallway and references Princess Carolyn by name, and her portrait hangs in a public sitting room near the front desk. Bookings for Room 314 are typically made months in advance.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Overnight in the 200-room 1902 grand hotel that hosted the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference. Guests can request Room 314, the suite that belonged to Carolyn Stickney Faucigny-Lucinge, where staff and visitors have reported the ghost of Princess Carolyn seated at the edge of the bed.
Three-course service in the original octagonal dining room, where the resort's haunted reputation is part of the after-dinner conversation. The room features the hotel's original architecture and views of the Presidential Range.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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