The Lafayette Hotel, Swim Club & Bungalows

The Lafayette Hotel, Swim Club & Bungalows is a hotel in San Diego, California, United States that opened 1946-7-1. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on 2012-7-31.

The Lafayette's original name was Imig Manor, owned by local entrepreneur Larry Imig. The Lafayette was originally built at a cost of $2 million on El Cajon Boulevard. When Imig Manor opened in 1946, its first guest was Bob Hope; other celebrities followed. “The buildings and the pool are steeped in the history of Hollywood’s heyday, the 1940s and ’50s,” according to the developer.

By 1960, Interstate 8 replaced El Cajon Boulevard as the main east-west connector of San Diego, and hotel operations ceased due to the loss of through traffic on El Cajon Boulevard. The building was passed through several owners, until Hampstead Lafayette Partners purchased 2.6 acre in North Park, including the Lafayette Hotel, for $11.5 million in March 2004. Hampstead Partners is restoring the Lafayette as a boutique hotel. In 2010 a year-long, $4 million facelift was announced, aided by a $2.4 million loan from the city's Redevelopment Agency. District 3 City Councilmember Todd Gloria called the revitalization a return to the hotel's “glamour and opulence.”

The hotel was closed from fall 2022 to summer 2023 for extensive renovations, including upgrades for the guest rooms and the addition of eight new restaurants and bars. The hotel reopened in July 2023 after a $31 million renovation.

The hotel has a swimming pool designed by Johnny Weissmuller, a ballroom, and 141 guest suites, each named for a great name in film history.

In popular culture
The Lafayette Hotel served as a film set for the feature film Top Gun.