Thirteen years of alpine hospitality
Since 2013
A guesthouse that grew into a legend
In 2013, hotelier Margaret Holloway opened a six-room guesthouse in a schist cottage above Brunswick Street. She kept one tradition from the start: every evening ended with a card game at the long rimu table — guests, staff and neighbours, playing for nothing but the pleasure of the company.
When the lodge was rebuilt in 2019, that table became the Salon — a proper casino-inspired room in brass, baize and velvet. Twenty-eight rooms now look over Lake Wakatipu and The Remarkables, yet the ritual remains exactly the same: cards in hand, phones away, conversation until midnight.
Thirteen years on, we are still a physical hotel in one place, run by people you can meet. That will never change.
The Concept
Casino elegance, mountain honesty
We borrowed the atmosphere of Europe's grand gaming salons — the low lamps, the green baize, the ceremony of a dealt hand — and left everything else behind. There are no stakes at our tables, no winnings, no accounts and no apps. Guests play for house chips that are swept away at midnight.
Around that idea sits a very New Zealand hotel: schist walls that hold the day's warmth, rimu timber cut from sustainable forests, hand-loomed wool on every bed, and the produce of Central Otago on every plate.
Aktionslichtpunkt offers no real-money gambling and no online gaming of any kind. The Salon is social entertainment for staying guests — face-to-face, on the premises, always.
Philosophy
Slow hospitality, done by hand
We believe luxury is attention — to materials, to seasons, to the person in front of you. Nothing here is automated, outsourced or online.
Everything we build is local — schist from the Kawarau, rimu from the West Coast, wool from high-country stations. The hotel should feel inevitable, like it grew here.
The Salon works because it is real. You cannot download the feeling of a dealt hand, a raised eyebrow across the table, the laugh after a bold bluff that wins nothing.
Our rule is simple: if a guest can do it on their phone, we do not offer it. What we offer is the room, the view, the evening — and each other.
Come and See
Some things only happen in person
Thirteen years of evenings by the lake — we would love to host yours.
Book a Stay