Dozens of dilapidated and dilapidated former hotels, casinos and state resorts sit along Croatia’s beautiful Adriatic coast, abandoned after the Yugoslav wars.
But there is one with a particularly salacious history: the Haludovo Hotel.
In the 1970s, it was a paradise of hedonism. Conceived and financed by Bob Guccione, one of America’s most infamous porn barons, hostesses in corsets called ‘Penthouse Pets’ paraded around and brought champagne to guests. Saddam Hussein would stay in the master suite.
Now it’s littered with graffiti and debris, a building code nightmare.
But although the former ‘Peace and Porn’ palace is a deteriorating shell, many curious tourists still make pilgrimages to its remains, on the sun-drenched island of Krk, to capture its abandoned grandeur in photographs. Haludovo is a decaying structure almost as fascinating as it was when it was a flashpoint.
The Haludovo Hotel, on the island of Krk in Croatia, was built in the late 1960s to be a decadent pleasure palace for American tourists and celebrities.
The Haludovo Hotel was conceived and financed by porn czar Bob Guccione
In its heyday, the opulent estate had 17 tennis courts, a mini soccer field and a mini golf course, as well as water skiing, paragliding and diving centers, multiple swimming pools and a bowling alley.
In the 1960s, Guccione – founder of Penthouse Magazine, the first American publication to feature frontal nudity – dreamed of building a luxurious resort in Malinska, Krk, consisting of luxury hotels and a large casino, to attract a wealthy American clientele. to the country. Socialist Yugoslavia was largely ignored.
It seemed like a shrewd business decision: Although the country had casinos for tourists, Yugoslavia’s residents were prohibited from gambling in them. As a result, casinos were largely tax-free.
Guccione hoped that wealthy American tourists would head to Krk to stake their money at his hotel, where he could hire locals to work without any American labor regulations at play.
In a 1972 interview with Radio Free EuropeGuccione said he believed his complex would be a “real formula in the fight against the Cold War”, stating that it would help humanize Croatian socialists in the eyes of Americans and vice versa.
Guccione invested $45 million (approximately $376 million/£296 million in modern currency) in developing the property and casino (under the ownership of the Croatian business group Brodokomerc), hiring Boris Magaš, one of the architects. most famous Croatians of the 20th century. , to design the complex. At the time the hotel was strikingly modern: architects now consider it a classic example of the Brutalist style.
Designed by the famous Croatian architect Boris Magaš, the Haludovo hotel is considered by architects to be a classic example of brutalist architecture.
A 1972 Haludovo advertisement in Penthouse magazine described the complex as a “mile-long Xanadu of gleaming buildings (that) will become for international connoisseurs an excellent playground.”
The pool at the Haludovo hotel in the 1970s. One story, possibly apocryphal, holds that for a particularly debauched party the pool was filled with champagne.
A shadow of its former glory, although it attracts curious tourists and photographers, Haludovo is a rather dangerous place.
Construction took four years and the Haludovo Palace Hotel and Penthouse Adriatic Club Casino opened in 1972 to great fanfare. A 1972 advertisement for Haludovo in Penthouse magazine described the complex as a “mile-long Xanadu of gleaming buildings (which) will become for international connoisseurs an excellent playground for both the summer and winter seasons.” .
Every inch of the resort was designed for leisure, pleasure and decadence: from sparkling chandeliers to poolside cocktail service and from a bowling alley to modern “conversation areas.”
The opulent estate had 17 tennis courts, a mini soccer field and a mini golf, as well as water skiing, paragliding and diving centers. One story, possibly apocryphal, but nice to believe, tells that one of its many pools was perpetually filled with champagne.
Above is Bob Guccione. A friend called Haludovo part of Guccione’s “succession of colossally reckless business ventures.”
During its first year, reports estimate that guests consumed 100 kg (224 lb) of lobster, 5 kg (11 lb) of caviar, and hundreds of bottles of champagne each day. Penthouse ‘Pets’ – Guccione’s replica of Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Bunnies – flew in from the United States and served guests dressed in skimpy French maid dresses. Although it can be assumed that these ladies were employed to titillate, Guccione insisted in a publication They were part of his plan for East-West appeasement, calling them “the peace forces of the new world.”
In its heyday, the complex was a meeting point for global dictators and politicians, American weekend players, the Yugoslav music scene and ordinary citizens. Saddam Hussein was one of Haludovo’s most famous guests.
According to a Croatian publication The Balkanist, the Butcher of Baghdad once “left a $2,000 tip for a particularly nice pet.” It was also rumored that he had to delay his flight back to Baghdad “because his son left a golden gun under a pillow in his suite.”
What Haludovo didn’t do, however, was make money: In 1973 it declared bankruptcy due to its extravagant operating costs, though it managed to stay open for the next two decades (Guccione poured money into the property, some of which a friend I call succession of colossally reckless business ventures‘) until 1991, when Yugoslavia was devastated by civil war.
What was once a refuge for celebrities became a literal refuge: families displaced by the war were housed in the now-decommissioned hotel throughout the war. Upset when they were unceremoniously evicted from the property at the end of the war, many refugees stripped Haludovo of every item of value imaginable: pipes, radiators, copper cables and electrical outlets.
Strangely beautiful: elaborate graffiti at the entrance to the former Haludovo hotel. Image credit: baby food
The hotel became a refuge for people who lost their homes in the Yugoslav wars in the 1990s.
In its heyday, the complex was a meeting point for global dictators and politicians, American weekend players, the Yugoslav music scene and ordinary citizens. Saddam Hussein was one of Haludovo’s most famous guests.
The sunny island of Krk. A bridge connects the Adriatic area with the continent
In 1995 the hotel was privatized and the investor divided the huge property and sold it little by little. Although parts of the hotel reopened to guests, it never regained its former opulent patina or its clientele. The last registered guests visited in 2002.
Since then, it has deteriorated further and further. A shadow of its former glory, although it attracts curious tourists and photographers, this defunct pleasure palace is a rather dangerous place.
The Balkanist He said: ‘Piles of broken glass cover the ground. Large pieces of the concrete staircase have broken off and fallen to the ground. Floors buckle. All the skylights have shattered, leaving shards of jagged glass floating above our heads.
‘A long trail of blood leads up two flights of stairs to the top floor. And then there are the disturbing tags, probably written by high school students but still disturbing: ‘DIE, HELP ME, HELP ME’ and Saxa loquuntur, which is Latin for “the stones speak.”