A singular vision
Remember that famous ad for Remington razors where a man who obviously rates the perfect shave says: "I liked the razor so much, I bought the company"? Well, Jessica Sainsbury, 31, the driving force behind one of the UK's hippest country house hotels, has a similar approach.
A member of the well-known supermarket family, she's stayed in some of the best hotels in the world, but she tired of the stuffiness, chintz and predictability in some of this country's top venues and realised that the ultimate way to ensure the perfect hotel visit for young, urban professionals like herself was to create her own.
The result is the long-awaited Cowley Manor, set in 55 acres of listed gardens - with four lakes - in Gloucestershire. The 19th-century manor house opened as a contemporary country house hotel in August after a three-year refit by Sainsbury's friends, the architects De Matos Storey Ryan, and within three months had scooped two European Hotel Design Awards.
Sainsbury isn't around for this interview, but Tim House, joint executive director with his wife, Lucy, is. You could describe House as an old-school hotelier turned trendsetter. He trained for seven years at the Savoy Group, spent nine years at London's Halcyon hotel and opened Fawsley Hall in Northamptonshire, from where he still commutes. Inspired by a stint at the Peponi hotel - "a very cool place" - in Kenya, he and Lucy became consultants and hooked up with Sainsbury. At the time, they were also working with her cousin, Mark Sainsbury (co-owner of London restaurant Moro), who wanted advice on a hotel in London called Zeta, which is still to open.
Design accolades
As House explains it, Sainsbury didn't set out to win design accolades for the hotel, although everyone is pleased that it has. "We'd like people to say that this was a wonderful hotel and, by the way, it looks great - rather than there was crap service but great sofas."
As contemporary country house hotels go, however, it's not easy to ignore Cowley's design. Within the Italianate-style house and converted stables there are 30 minimalist furnished bedrooms, vast bathrooms, a 60-seat listed pear-wood-panelled restaurant, a padded leather-walled billiard room, a private sitting room, a 14-seat private dining room with sandpaper wallpaper and the 30-seat Graveyard meeting room (so named because it overlooks one). Set apart from the main building is a subterranean spa and swimming pool designed in the modernist style.
And there are other quirky touches, too, such as original modern art throughout, including a piece by Alonso Gil in the private dining room where the image can be seen only in the dark; glimpses of fuchsia-pink chairs and cowhide rugs; fake animal heads on the bar wall by British artist David Farrar; and a loudspeaker disguised as a rock on the terrace.
Sainsbury won't divulge how much it has all cost, because it is privately funded, but she has been rumoured as saying that the cheap part was buying the property.
Business options
It's not just a money-thirsty hobby, however. Sainsbury and husband, Peter Frankopan, had no experience in hotels, so they signed themselves up at the London Hotel School. Ultimately, however, they rely on business advice from House. At the planning stage, Sainsbury told him what her dream hotel should have - for instance, total exclusivity for guests - and House gave her the business options. He'd present three sets of figures and run through alternative operating methods and what the return would be for each one. Between them they sorted out what would work.
"I would say, you can spend 10 times as much and have everything you want, or spend this amount and get a quick return - often we would go for something in between."
One of Sainsbury's bugbears is over-formality. As a result, the 58 staff project an image of being friendly and efficient, and it's hard to sort out the managers from the rest. Everyone front of house wears polo-neck sweaters or tank tops in greens, lavenders or blues; they all look guests in the eye and talk to them politely but not deferentially; and their body language shows they are totally relaxed in their hotel. "Yes, the staff feel comfortable," agrees House. "They are not in-your-face."
All the managers have five-star hotel backgrounds and what House describes as the key elements of great service, but he retrains them to take the formality away. Service, for instance, is from the left or the right depending on what's not going to interrupt guests too much. It has, he admits, led to one or two accusations of being "amateurish" but, as far as he is concerned, instinctive service is the way forward for modern hoteliers. "I say to the staff, ‘Imagine you are sitting here on a Friday evening and imagine how you would like to be looked after.'"
As House points out, some of Sainsbury's pet hates would not be indulged in mainstream hotels. For instance, there's a policy of turning away parties of guests who need more than 20 rooms (although he is happy to allow a party to take the whole hotel). Equally, small meetings where delegates require 12 or so rooms is fine, but he won't tolerate his guests being swamped by corporate crowds. "We are strict that we won't take anything away from individual guests," says House.
As a result, he concedes that he is not looking for the highest yield, but at the same time there are targets, and where the bottom line is concerned Sainsbury is guided by House. He reckons that, like most country house hotels, custom won't be particularly seasonal and that by next year he will be able to predict the next four years' business accurately. In the meantime, he is expecting to far exceed the conservative estimate of 46% occupancy and £2m turnover this year. Weekends are 100% leisure, with a 50:50 split on weekdays that House expects will change to 75% business.
Huge potential
"I was not sure how fast we would come out of the blocks and how quickly people would come to a new hotel. I was thinking of the worst-case scenario - if we go to war tomorrow, etc. We are the new boys with a long way to go, but there is huge potential for massive growth," says House.
Rates start at £205 for what, in Cowley-speak, is a Good room, rising to £395 for the Best room, but House is loath to discount rooms to fill the currently slack midweek. He says they have priced the hotel to sit between the rates of their competitors - which in some cases hit £500.
House has a healthy respect for the competition. He reckons that, although Babington House in nearby Somerset does attract the same clientele, it won't take a huge dent. He also admires Olga Polizzi's Tresanton hotel down in Cornwall. "They got it right. It's of an ilk," he says.
All marketing is done by sales and marketing company Mason Rose and PR Elizabeth Crompton Batt, but there won't be overt advertising. The hotel was aimed at successful young professionals and is currently attracting 25- to 45-year-olds, some with families. House - who has a baby girl - says it is a child-friendly hotel, but they don't advertise the fact, even though there's a playroom and baby-sitting facility. As yet, most of the guests are British, but once marketing abroad gets going next year they are curious to see how it will go down with Americans. "It's an easy product to sell," says House.
Teething problems
That may be so, but it's been hard work in the making, with the opening date put back several times. There are reasons for that. Several aspects of the house are listed, such as the former winter garden, which now houses the downstairs loos in a freestanding construction, and the gardens themselves. Then there were the inevitable teething problems. During the soft opening in the summer, Sainsbury's friends and family pointed out that, for example, the water pressure needed tweaking. House explains: "We hadn't experienced 30 people taking showers at the same time, so some water in the end rooms took longer."
The work will never end, either. House says the hotel will be on a five-year refurbishment cycle but, in practice, he recognises it will be ongoing, "like the Forth Bridge". He adds: "The walls are huge palettes of colour, so one small scratch and we will be off again."
The hard work and long wait hasn't put Sainsbury nor the rest of the team off opening more hotels. The plan is to do one in the UK, probably on the Norfolk or Suffolk coast, and another on the Continent, in either Brussels, Amsterdam or Paris. "We now know it will take two or three years [to open a new hotel], so I have got plenty of time to sort Cowley out," says House.
So how does it feel to swap the world of traditional hotels for Cowley Manor? "It's a different world," says House. "This has been created by a small group of people, and we are running it as we four want to run it. There are no rules. Nothing has to be done."
Cowley Manor
Cowley, Gloucestershire GL53 9NL
Tel: 01242 870900
Web site: www.cowleymanor.com
Owners: Jessica Sainsbury and Peter Frankopan
Executive directors: Tim and Lucy House
General manager: Stuart McPherson
Opened: August 2002
Projected turnover for first year: £2m
Projected average occupancy: 46%
Bedrooms: 30
Room rates: Best £395, Exceptional £335, Great £295, Better £265, Good £205
The house
The 19th-century listed building took three years to convert into a contemporary country house hotel. Apart from the time it took for the design teams to agree on everything, several elements inside the building were listed, and so adjustments had to be made to the contemporary design.
As a result, two run-down art deco bathrooms have been concealed behind walls, while a third, which was restored, is being used. Similarly listed is all the pear-wood panelling in the dining room and previous owner Sir James Horlick's former study, all of which had to be painstakingly French polished. The study has had to be converted carefully, so the bed and bathroom fittings are all freestanding.
Nevertheless, House says, there are no regrets that they chose an old building. "Maybe Jessica would have thought twice at the beginning if she knew it would take so long, but the juxtaposition of old and new turns the idea of a country house hotel on its head," he says. "It's an old building, and we have done something revolutionary with it."
The spa
Unlike the listed house, creating the new-build modernist spa was almost trouble-free - despite the fact that the 55-acre garden is listed. As a result, English Heritage insisted the spa, named C-side, was semi-subterranean. It forced the architects to be even more creative, and so from the rooms in the main building guests can see only a few grassy mounds, the C-side roof planted in lavender and - rather mysteriously on a cold day - the steam rising from the outdoor heated swimming pool.
Sainsbury initially didn't want C-side to have members or children but, as House pointed out, it didn't make economic sense to bar them. "The figures with no members were so shocking that she went halfway," says House. "The aim now is to take 150 members."
Members pay £700 a year and, under the planning terms, locals pay £47 a month.
The restaurant
In what might seem to some to be a commercially disastrous decision, the 60-cover restaurant is not open to non-residents on Fridays and Saturdays, as Sainsbury didn't want guests ever to have to wait for a table. Similarly, the hotel is not open to the public for teas and coffees. "It's a private experience," says House. "The kitchen knows what to expect, the service is slick - and we don't get too greedy."
Chef Robin Smith, who has worked at places such as L'Escargot and Hanbury Manor, changes the menu daily, so guests don't get bored, and offers dishes such as seared swordfish steak with squid ink tagliatelle, broad beans and tomato dressing (£18) and pan-fried calves' liver with basil-creamed potato, carrot and swede pur‚e and shallot gravy (£15.50). Sainsbury also insisted that comfort food, such as steak and kidney pie or steak and chips, are on the menu every day, with a less formal menu for lunch. Everything is written in simple language to avoid being intimidating. "Nothing needs explanation and nothing is stacked," says House, adding: "Descriptions such as coulis and jus are banned."
Sainsbury's edict was that, as they had a captive custom, they should not overprice the menu. A three-course dinner costs about £30 a head, and wine ranges from £15 to £60.
"We are not aiming for ratings or to be in the guidebooks, but if someone wants to dish one out, that's fine," says House.
The chandeliers
Designed by architects De Matos Storey Ryan, House says that one of them spent two days on a scaffold drilling holes through the ceiling for the wires. The crystal shards are lit by fibreoptic lights in the floor.
The bedrooms and bathrooms
There are 15 bedrooms in the main house and a further 15 in the recently converted stable block (although five still have to be completed). Fabrics were designed individually for each room by Govindia Hemphill Tsang and the furniture was designed specifically for Cowley Manor by Sarah Kay and Andrea Stemmer using oak, stone, leather and glass. Other furniture was sourced by Coexistence.
Sainsbury's husband, Peter Frankopan, likes gadgets, and so all the rooms have remote-control handsets for the Loewe TVs, Marantz DVD players and Nakamichi wall-mounted CD players. Rooms were redesigned again and again until the team felt sure guests could watch TV from their beds or - where baths are in the bedrooms - guests could swivel the TV to watch it from the bath. Such were the lengths they went to that they even checked whether a guest's feet would obscure the view when lying in bed.
There are also little touches such as rubber ashtrays that don't burn or mark and tactile Do Not Disturb signs that are already "going missing". All rooms have a C-side basket for the spa, packed with robes, and the minibars have full-sized bottles and hangover cures.
As most rooms in the main house have been left whole, bathrooms are generally huge. All have deep-fill baths and double basins and many have walk-through showers. In the Best room bathroom the loo is concealed under a bench.
The converted stable block houses three triple-level bedrooms and a further six rooms with cantilevered bathrooms overhanging the bedrooms to make the most of the high ceilings. Without this space-saving design, it would not have been possible to have built more than three rooms.
All the door keys are programmable, so a family can have keys programmed for access to each of their bedrooms and, say, the private sitting room. Similarly, doors in corridors can be locked by reprogramming the keys, thus forming suites of rooms for friends or families.
The bar
American cherry-wood panelling and quirky animal heads by British artist David Farrar. The lighting is dimmed towards evening when the fires are lit.
The design team
ARCHITECTS
De Matos Storey Ryan
020 7619 9088
FURNITURE DESIGN
Sarah Kay and Andrea Stemmer
020 7503 2105
FURNITURE SPECIALIST
Coexistence
020 7354 8817
TEXTILE DESIGNERS
Govindia Hemphill Tsang
020 7426 0745
GRAPHICS
Jimmy Yang
020 7622 5788
GARDEN DESIGN
Noel Kingsbury
