History Of English Hotels
In the medieval period alehouses were ordinary dwellings where the householder served home-brewed ale and beer. If lodging for travellers was offered, this might be no more than bedding on the floor in the kitchen, or in a barn. Inns by contrast were generally purpose-built to accommodate travellers. They needed more bedrooms than the average house and substantial stabling. Inns fell into disuse after 410AD. People did not travel, except on pilgrimages, so it was for this kind of traveller that occasional spartan accommodation was provided. Abbeys sometimes had a hospice at a market town, at a place of pilgrimage, or at key points along the road or river routes that pilgrims might take. Examples include, the New Inn in Gloucester and the George and Pilgrim at Glastonbury. In 1180 the Eastbridge was founded in Canterbury High Street to provide accommodation for pilgrims flocking to the shine of Thomas Becket who was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170. The Eastbridge Hospital survives and can be visited. The monasteries also offered free doles of bread and ale. This service is still provided at the hospital of St Cross in Winchester.
Historically, the most popular lodging in London were guest houses and coaching inns. Coaching Inns provided two facilities for mail and stage coaches. Firstly they allowed teams of horses to be changed for fresh ones and they also served the stage coach passengers with a place to sleep and eat.

Although the term hotel was not established the first English hotel was built in Exeter in 1768. It wasn't until the 19th century that London began to see a rise in the traditional type of hotels we know of these days. Even then they tended to be much smaller in size than their counter parts across the Atlantic in America. Today just a single example of the old coaching inns remains, the George Inn on Borough High Street in Southwark.

Some statistical background came be drawn from an issue of the Penny Magazine, a weekly London newspaper of its day. The April 8th edition of 1837 gives the following information:

In 1837 there was 396 inns, hotels and taverns in total (but not including pubs that allowed overnight accommodation for their customers). Private guest houses numbered 34. Hotels that were deemed to be of a high standard were called 'Palace Inns' numbered around 30. They were all located around the area we know of today as the West End.

Although the first budget targeted hotels appeared in the mid 1980's it wasn't until around 2000 that this type of accommodation really started to grow substantially. In 2000 it was reported that London had some 1170 hotels and bed and breakfast accommodations known to the English Tourism Council / London Tourist Board. The modern rise in hotel numbers began between the two world wars.
Then with the announcement that London as to host the 2012 Olympics came an explosion in the number of budget oriented hotels and dedicated budget chains. These are the Inn or Lodge type hotels and the market is dominated by Premier Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Ibis and Travelodge.

Contribution that the English made to the Development of the Resort Industry

In the outlying provinces, baths were located at sites which possessed mineral springs. The value of certain mineral springs in restoring health had been known since earliest times. Greeks connected the mineral springs with the gods and built holy wells and altars on the sites. For the satisfaction of the Roman legions, baths were later developed on the sites of these holy wells. In England, the Romans developed both Bath and Buxton, which were known for their thermal springs. The hot waters of bath were particularly famous, being considered by many as the eighth wonder of the ancient world. In bath, recent architectural evidence suggests that the Celts may have built their own baths on the site long before the Romans.
When the Roman Empire declined and the legions were pulled out of Britain circa A.D.410, the social life at Bath and Buxton languished and was not revived until the seventeenth century when improvements in the London roads and the invention of the stagecoach again made pleasure travel feasible. During the Middle Ages, travel was undertaken mainly for business and religious purposes.

On the continent, the famous resort area of Spa Belgium was created in the fourteenth century. The area was founded in 1326 by a Belgian ironmaster, Colin le Loup, who was cured for his long-term illness by the iron-rich waters of a chalybeate spring near Liege. In gratitude of his cure he erected a shelter and welcomed other suffers. The area became so popular during the following years that the Belgian town where the spring was located came to be called “Spa” (which means fountain) after its central attraction. During the next two to three hundred years, many other chalybeate springs were discovered and became similarly famous; thus Spa functioned as one of the earliest Continental resorts.
During the restoration period, the development of the English spa marked the revival of the resort tradition in England. After a long war and the repression of Puritan rule, people were ready to make merry again, and King Charles II led the way. Charles II frequent all of the popular resorts of the period- Tunbridge Wells, Harrogate, Bath, and Buxton. It was during this period that physicians, who established the authenticity of the cures at the various springs, began to promote the water of Tunbridge Wells as an aphrodisiac.
Tales of romance and amorous adventures at the English spas did much to promote their popularity. Some of the elements like gambling, dancing and the relaxed social atmosphere are to be found in many resorts of later periods both on the Continent and in the United States. Other forms of entertainment include grand parade, aquatic theatres, the orchestra and the pump room.