There is a lot to love about The Grand Budapest Hotel, but one of our favorite aspects of the movie is the awesome tattoos that are sported by Harvey Keitel.

The Wes Anderson film is considered a modern classic with Keitel joining a stellar cast including top names like Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Adrien Brody and Jeff Goldblum.

Celebrity tattoos always catch the eye, but what is the story behind the tattoos on Keitel’s body as he plays the character of Ludwig in The Grand Budapest Hotel?

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Fiction, but based on a real hotel

The Grand Budapest Hotel is a fictional film, but a real location sparked Anderson into deciding to create the movie, which was released back in 2014, though it seems timeless.

The Grandhotel Pupp was the inspiration behind the fictional Grand Budapest, together with some other movie gems such as Bond’s Casino Royale.

Dating back to the early 18th century, the hotel was popular with celebrities of the era such as Johann Sebastian Bach, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Richard Wagner.

Located in Karlovy Vary, the hotel remains open to this day and it is popular with fans of The Grand Budapest Hotel, as well as those who just want to enjoy views of the Tepla River.

Filming did not actually take place at the Grandhotel Pupp but its exterior was used as the inspiration for the building in The Grand Budapest Hotel.

As the set designer Adam Stockhausen told National Geographic: “There were some interesting interior details of the hotel that we liked, such as the wide corridors with carpet running down the center and windows that shone light into the hallways.”

The Hotel Börse in Görlitz, Germany, was actually used for most of the filming, with the cast and crew all staying at the site during the production process, which must have been interesting.