Opened in the 1950s and closed a few years later, the Grande Hotel in Beira became a conference venue, then a war-time refuge. Today about 3,500 people live here in precarious conditions. A city inside a ruin, between memory and survival.

The Grande Hotel in Beira opened in 1955 as a statement of modern luxury. It closed in 1963, keeping its pool active and hosting occasional conferences. During Mozambique’s civil war from 1977 to 1992 it became a shelter for displaced families.
Today the former ballroom is a dormitory, corridors work like streets and the empty pool serves as a communal courtyard. An estimated 3,500 people live here in fragile conditions, with improvised water and power and a subsistence economy.
Modernist architecture remains under salt and humidity, with broken windows and exposed structure. Between monumental past and lived present, the hotel mirrors the city and its inequalities. Relocation plans have been discussed for years, yet life keeps reorganising itself inside the shell of the building.
These photographs connect past and present. They show how a symbol of luxury became a shelter and how a city finds ways to endure within its own ruins.