The Editor's Hospitality Blog

It's traditional for the outgoing Hotelier of the Year to host the following year's award lunch. This year's award was therefore presented to Michael Gray at Calcot Manor, whose Managing Director, Richard Ball, was the 2006 winner.

Welcoming guests to the lunch, Richard emphasised the fear-factor involved in throwing your hotel open to an A-list of pretty much every UK hotelier of note from the past quarter-century. (This year, the lunch drew its usual stellar list of hotelkeepers, among them Robin Hutson, Ramon Pajares, Peter Lederer, Martin Skan, Harry Murray ...)

He described how, as a younger man trying to establish his country house hotel in Gloucestershire, he had read of Hoteliers of the Year in the Caterer and wondered whether perhaps, one day, one of these iconic hoteliers would deign to come and stay with him.

"I never imagined 17 of the buggers would turn up on the same day!" he quipped.

It's been a busy week! I breakfasted with Jaume Tapies, chairman of Relais & Chateaux, last Friday, at the group's recently-opened 'maison' in London's Beauchamp Place. the property is effectively a shop window for the hundreds of luxury restaurants and hotels within the collection, offering passers-by a chance to browse marketing material and cookbooks, get a sense of the properties and book a stay.

Tapies tells me that Relais & Chateaux has been prospecting British hotels and has for the first time been "knocking on doors" at those hotels it feels would be worthy additions to the brand. He expects that at least ten or twelve more UK properties will feature in the collection in the next two to three years. He also promises that the 2009 guide will "change completely" from previous years' editions, with the generic page template replaced by a fresher and more design-led approach.

Monday of this week saw the start of three days of intensive Cateys judging at the splendid Dorchester Hotel on London's Park Lane. I now know the identies of the majority of Cateys winners for 2008 - but if I told you I'd then have to kill you, as they say, so I'm keeping shtumm. What I can tell you is that the winners were chosen by a bewildering array of hospitality's great and good. Judges included Brian Wisdom of People 1st, the IOH's Philippe Rossiter, Bob Cotton, Heston Blumenthal, Hotelier of the Year Michael Gray, Robert Cook of Malmaison and Hotel du Vin, Travelodge's Grant Hearn, William Baxter, Alaistair Storey, Marcus Wareing and a host of other big names.

Judging is an exacting - and exhausting - process. Luckily, I was able to recharge the batteries with a fortifying dinner at Restaurant Tom Aikens, above the King's Road. the occasion was the restaurant's fifth birthday, and Tom pulled out all the stops to create a stunning tasting menu that was complemented by great wines picked by head sommelier and 2008 UK Sommelier of the Year winner, Gearoid Devaney. Happy birthday, Tom.

One award not yet allocated is the Silver Award - and we need your help with this category. Which individual has, in your opinion, done more to further the cause of UK hospitality in the past 25 years? let us know and you could win yourself a pair of tickets to the industry 's Oscars night in July.

Two very important sets of awards are unveiled tonight at London's Royal Lancaster hotel.

This evening, hotel employees from all around Britain will be recognised for their work at the 2008 Hotel Cateys and we will also be unveiling the 2008 Caterer and Hotelkeeper Hotelier of the Year in association with Louis Jadot.

To find out who will be 2007 Hotelier of the Year Michael Gray's successor and to get all the Hotel Cateys results, be sure to log on to caterersearch.com at around 11.30pm tonight!