Metropole City Hall Building

“In the main hotel, the Metropol, people of all races and nationalities were seen, birds of passage.”

This is how one of the characters in Agatha Christie’s novel Miss Company describes the place where the queen of crime fiction stayed with her daughter and her personal secretary in 1927. Here, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Agatha Christie found rest, mild weather and inspiration for some of her literary works.

From the old hotel, only the name Metropole remains today, along with a commemorative plaque that can be seen on the rear façade of the building that now houses the municipal offices. These offices occupy the site where the British subject James Pinnoch built a recreational residence in 1889 to accommodate fellow countrymen visiting the island. Owing to the rapid increase in visitors and the shortage of accommodation—construction of Hotel Santa Catalina began in 1890—the building was soon expanded and converted into a hotel.

In 1940, the property was acquired by the City Council of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and rebuilt to continue operating as a hotel. Later, in 1960, architect Miguel Martín-Fernández de la Torre was responsible for a further renovation. Finally, in 1977, the municipal offices were transferred from the Casas Consistoriales in Vegueta to this building in Ciudad Jardín.