People First

In the heart of Pécs, on the city's famous Király Street, stands one of its most iconic hotels, the Palatinus Grand Hotel. Opened in 1915, the hotel was built by the Hamerli family, renowned for their glove manufacturing business, to designs by architect Andor Pilch. This beautiful Art Nouveau and late Eclectic-style building was a hotel and an important centre of social life from the very beginning, complete with a café, restaurant and ballroom. The building, now more than a century old, has recently undergone a complete renovation, preserving its historic character while modernising the hotel's facilities and services. Located just steps from Széchenyi Square, the hotel is only a few minutes away from Pécs's main city-centre attractions.

We visited and assessed the hotel in September 2026. Overall, we found it to be well suited to guests with mobility impairments, with interior spaces, a lift and an accessible room designed to support independent use.

There is no threshold at the main entrance, although some wheelchair users may need assistance on the short but relatively steep ramp. There is no tactile guidance path leading to the hotel entrance, and none inside the building.

The reception desk is at a suitable height for wheelchair users and can be used independently. However, there is no induction loop at reception, nor is there any tactile guidance leading to the desk.

The hotel's interior spaces are spacious, with wide corridors that are easy to navigate in a wheelchair. Lighting is adequate throughout. A lift connects the different floors and is easy for wheelchair users to use independently. Its door is 90 cm wide, there is enough space inside to turn around, and the control buttons are within reach from a wheelchair. Braille labels and audio announcements also help guests find their way.

The hotel's only accessible room is spacious, offering plenty of room to move around comfortably in a wheelchair. The door is wide and easy to open, with a 2 cm threshold. The bed is at a suitable height and can be approached from either side in a wheelchair. While the room itself has no carpet, the corridor leading to it is carpeted. Fortunately, the accessible room is located close to the lift, so wheelchair users only need to travel a few metres along the carpeted corridor.

The en-suite bathroom is spacious and has no threshold. Its door is 90 cm wide and can be opened independently. There is sufficient knee clearance beneath the washbasin, the tap is within reach from a wheelchair, and the mirror is positioned at a suitable height. The walk-in shower is equipped with a seat, and an emergency alarm is also provided.

The toilet is located in the same room as the shower and washbasin. It can be approached from either side in a wheelchair, and there is enough space to make a full 360-degree turn. A fixed grab rail is fitted on the wall side, with a fold-up grab rail on the other side. An emergency alarm is also available.

The ground-floor restaurant can be reached without steps or thresholds. Its spacious interior allows wheelchair users to move around and turn comfortably. Although the restaurant does not have its own accessible toilet, one is available next to the event hall, also on the ground floor, and can be reached without steps.

The hotel is also an excellent venue for events and conferences. It offers five conference rooms of different sizes, suitable for everything from small training sessions to events attended by several hundred people. All conference rooms are wheelchair accessible and can be used by wheelchair users, with an accessible toilet located nearby in each case.

Website:
The Palatinus Grand Hotel website is easy to navigate for users with mobility impairments, with the most important information available in just a few clicks. We also found it generally easy to use for people with limited hand function. The room options include a dedicated accessible room category, the Deluxe accessible room.
For users with visual impairments, however, the website is not accessible, even though it can be navigated using a keyboard. On the homepage, information and page elements are repeated unnecessarily, creating an overwhelming amount of information that makes the website difficult for screen reader users to navigate. The heading hierarchy also makes it difficult to find one's way around the site, as it is not always clear which pieces of information belong together. Images on the website lack short text descriptions. On both the homepage and the room booking interface, some controls are either missing labels or have not been labelled at all, meaning screen readers cannot identify them. As a result, visually impaired users who rely on screen readers are unable to book rooms online.

Getting there:
If arriving by bus, we recommend getting off at the Árkád shopping centre. From there, the hotel can be reached along an accessible route via Irgalmasok Street, Széchenyi Square and Király Street in approximately 10 minutes. The route slopes slightly uphill, and tactile guidance paths help people with visual impairments find their way.
For guests arriving by car, an accessible parking space is available in the underground garage, which can be entered from Mária Street. The parking space is sufficiently wide, although it is not yet marked with a sign or painted markings. From the garage, the hotel can be reached via a lift along an accessible route.