The Edgefield Hotel | Edgefield, SC

In 2017, a leading Edgefield citizen donated the town’s historic hotel to Preservation South Carolina with but one condition: Could you please use your resources to determine if this property, that has been closed for a number of years, could be reopened as a boutique hotel? We agreed to take on the project.

The original hotel was built in 1813 and known as the Planters Inn, and later, as the Ryan Hotel after the Ryan family that owned it at the time. For much of the 19th century, the property was used as a tavern and hotel. This early frame structure would burn in the fire of 1892. It was not until 1919, when local leaders of Edgefield, invested in building what we see today.

Over the building's lifespan, it was owned by the likes of South Carolina Senator Strom Thurmond, and W.W. Mims. The hotel was a part of the social scene in Edgefield, where dinners, receptions, and parties were regularly held. During the 1960s, under ownership of W.W. Mims, the building was used as a housing for countless World War II survivors.

Today, the Edgefield hotel is as an embodiment of the heritage of small, upstate southern towns, where business-people and tourists showed up for pleasant dinners and comfortable beds.

Preservation South Carolina is extremely excited to partner with Key Advisors and the University of South Carolina's School of Hospitality and Tourism in developing a hotel feasibility plan for the first phase of the project.

It is our mission to restore, preserve, and integrate this magnificent building back into the community as the anchor it once was to this charming town.