Our Story Lives in These Walls
A century of stories, elegance, and hospitality that'll make you feel right at home
Look, we're not gonna bore you with some stuffy corporate origin story. The Mythralith Quintho's been standing proud in Vancouver since 1897, and honestly? The building's seen more than most folks ever will. Started as a private mansion for the Wellington family - old money, the kind that actually meant something back then.
Fast forward through prohibition (yep, there were secret rooms), the jazz era, a stint as an officers' club during WWII, and you get to 1982 when the Quintho Group decided this beauty deserved better than becoming condos. They restored every inch - and I mean EVERY inch - keeping all the original character while sneaking in modern comforts you actually want.
Today? We're probably the only place in Vancouver where you can sleep in a room with 100-year-old crown molding, take a spa treatment that'd make royalty jealous, and still get solid WiFi. That's the sweet spot we live in.
Charles Wellington III commissioned the mansion right after striking it big in the Klondike. Hired architects straight from Montreal who basically said "let's build something they'll never forget" - and they weren't kidding. The grand staircase alone took craftsmen eight months to complete.
Prohibition hit different in Vancouver. The Wellington heirs weren't about to let a little law stop their parties. They installed hidden panels in the library and a tunnel to the carriage house. Rumor has it some of Vancouver's biggest deals went down in those secret rooms. You can still tour 'em today.
During the war, the family donated the entire property as an officers' quarters and planning facility. There's a plaque in the main hall commemorating the strategic meetings held here. Some guests swear they can still feel that sense of purpose in the ballroom.
The mansion became THE spot for visiting celebrities. Grace Kelly stayed here. So did Cary Grant. The guestbook from those years reads like an Oscar ceremony. The Wellington Suite still has original furniture from that era - yeah, actual movie stars sat on that couch.
Quintho Group stepped in when developers wanted to demolish the place. Took five years and a team of heritage specialists who basically lived on-site. They matched original paint colors, restored every piece of millwork, and tracked down period-appropriate fixtures from estate sales across North America. Labor of love doesn't even cover it.
Added the spa wing and upgraded every room with smart tech, modern bathrooms, and climate control that actually works. But here's the thing - you'd never know it wasn't original. The new stuff blends so well that guests genuinely can't tell what's 1897 and what's 2010. That's intentional.
We're not a museum pretending to be a hotel. We're a working, breathing piece of Vancouver's story that happens to offer killer rooms, amazing food, and service that feels more like having a really connected friend in the city. The building's got another century in it, easy, and we're just getting started.
Every single piece of crown molding in the original building was hand-carved on-site. No two sections are identical - you can actually see the individual craftsman's techniques if you know what to look for. Our maintenance team has patterns for every design just in case, but in 127 years, we've only had to replace three pieces. They really built different back then.
Carved from single pieces of British Columbia oak, this staircase has been photographed probably ten thousand times. The balusters? Each one's slightly different. The handrail took an entire tree. When we restored it in '84, the craftsman cried when he saw the original work. Said he'd never seen joinery that perfect in his life.
The main landing's stained glass window came from a studio in Edinburgh. Shipped across the Atlantic, then by rail across Canada. Somehow survived the 1906 earthquake that rattled Vancouver pretty good. We've got the original shipping manifests framed in the office - the insurance alone cost more than most houses back then.
Seventeen working fireplaces throughout the property, each one different. Marble from Italy, slate from Wales, granite from right here in BC. The library fireplace has hand-painted tiles depicting scenes from Greek mythology. Guests used to leave coins in the hearths for luck - we found over $200 in old coins during the restoration.
We do heritage tours every Saturday at 2pm. See the secret prohibition rooms, check out the original blueprints, hear stories that never made it into the history books. It's free for guests, and honestly? It's pretty cool even if you're not usually into this stuff.
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Here's something you won't find on most hotel websites - our head concierge, Margaret, has been here 34 years. Our executive chef, Thomas, apprenticed in the same kitchen he now runs. Half our housekeeping team has been with us over a decade. That's not corporate speak, that's just reality.
People stick around because the building matters, the history matters, and treating guests like actual humans matters. We're not trying to be the biggest or the flashiest. We're trying to be the place where you walk in and someone remembers you wanted extra pillows last time, or asks how your daughter's graduation went.
That's the real secret sauce - it's not the crown molding or the historical significance, though that stuff's great. It's that we give a damn. Always have, probably always will. Come see for yourself.