Eton Collection founder Peter Tyrie to set up new hotel venture

Peter Tyrie is looking to set up a new hotel venture in 2010 following his departure as managing director from the Eton Collection of luxury hotels.

Having founded the Eton Collection in 1999, Tyrie sold the business in 2007 for £70m to JJW Hotels & Resorts, owned by Mohamed Bin Issa Al Jaber.  “I stayed on for two years after selling the company to help integrate the hotels into the new business and now I’m ready to move on,” he told Caterer as he attended the 21st European Hotel Investment Conference at the Dorchester hotel, London, on Wednesday.

Tyrie says he is proud of having been one of the first hoteliers to build a small UK boutique group at the luxury end of the market.  Regarding the future, he believes this will depend on opportunity.

“This is more likely to be a buy-into or buy-out of an existing opportunity, rather than a start-up which I have now done three times and is extremely hard, particularly in the type of market we are currently in,” he says.  “It most definitely will be city centre, possibly international and at the top end of the market.”

A replacement has not yet been appointed to replace Tyrie.  “We will probably not have an announcement about the position for a couple of months,” said Andrea King, director group corporate communications of MBI International & Partners, the parent company of JJW Hotels & Resorts.

The Eton Collection operates seven of luxury boutique-style hotels in the UK: the Academy, the Colonnade and Threadneedles hotel in London; 42 The Calls and Quebec in Leeds; and the Glasshouse and the Scotsman in Edinburgh. The Berners hotel, off Oxford Street, London, which is currently closed and undergoing refurbishment, may be the eighth hotel to join the Eton Collection upon its reopening in 2010.

Besides The Eton Collection, JJW Hotels & Resorts operates a total of 75 hotels throughout Austria, France, Portugal, Switzerland and Egypt.

JJW buys The Eton Collection >>

Eton Collection keeps rates firm as bookings fall >>

Peter Tyrie profile >>


By Janet Harmer

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