Louisville · Downtown – Fourth Street
The Brown Hotel
James Graham Brown's 1923 hotel at Fourth and Broadway, built to rival the Seelbach; chef Fred K. Schmidt created the Hot Brown here in 1926.
- Built
- 1923Built as a hotel for James Graham Brown in about ten months at a cost of more than $4 million and opened in 1923 as a 16-story, 600-room hotel.
- Style
- Georgian Revival exterior with English Renaissance interiors
- Architect
- Preston J. Bradshaw
- Type
- Grand hotel
- Area
- Downtown – Fourth Street
- Credentials
- Listed on the National Register of Historic Places; Historic Hotels of America member
The story
Lumber businessman James Graham Brown built the hotel at Fourth and Broadway to rival the Seelbach, and former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George was the first guest to sign the register. Chef Fred K. Schmidt created the Hot Brown sandwich in 1926 for the crowds of more than 1,200 at the hotel’s dinner dances. The 1937 Ohio River flood put the whole first floor under water. After Brown’s death in 1969 the hotel closed and the building became the Jefferson County Board of Education’s headquarters, then reopened as a hotel in the early 1980s; 1859 Historic Hotels bought and restored it in 2006.
Good to know
- Address: 335 W Broadway, Louisville, KY 40202
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Last verified October 2026. Details change; confirm with the inn before you book.