Believing authenticity and passion to be the key to his resorts’ success, he added: “A man in his life has many loves, one in fact wherever he wanders. In my case they became hotels.” Rumours of the turndown service including a horse’s head placed alongside a chocolate on the pillow are as yet uncorroborated.
Musicians can arguably give actors a run for their money when it comes to celebrity hotel ownership, having gained valuable insight into what makes a good place to stay from spending so much of their time on the road. Take Simply Red singer Mick Hucknall, who must have been getting it right with Malmaison, the chain he co-founded in 1994 which played a major role in revolutionising the UK hotel scene with the introduction of a new style of boutique hotel, largely set in converted historic buildings. He sold up in 2000 for a cool £76 million.
A celebrity owner may lure guests in, but unless the hotel is ticking all the other boxes, they can kiss repeat custom goodbye. Abba’s Benny Andersson scored invaluable coverage for Hotel Rival when all four members of the band showed up to Mamma Mia’s Swedish premiere, held in his Stockholm hotel in 2008, but it is the eclectic design and attention to detail that has sustained the business.
Spreading his customary fairy dust at the Goodtime is Pharrell Williams, who joined the hotelier ranks in April 2021. No corner has been under-designed in this quintessentially South Beach joint. In a video I watched recently, co-owner David Grutman ruminated on the role of the hotel’s library. I presumed he was going to make a comment on the opportunity to carve out a quiet space away from noise and ostentation (in the hotel and the city), but instead he described the chance to “just have a full Instagrammable moment”. I mocked my own antiquated values and realised he was absolutely right.
Grutman and Williams have captured the zeitgeist perfectly and tapped into exactly what their specific clientele wants. But I do worry that, when it’s all about the ’gram, they will need to do a costly design overhaul fairly frequently – but I am missing the point. This isn’t about being practical; it’s about fantasy and how, for a brief moment, money can buy entry into a celebrity-obsessed world.
Operating restaurants at the Corinthia in London and (Gary Neville’s) the Stock Exchange in Manchester, chef Tom Kerridge is no slouch. He also runs the two-Michelin-star pub with rooms the Hand and Flowers in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. Kerridge shares this advice with aspiring celebrity hotel owners: “Make sure you find the right people for the right jobs. Build yourself an infrastructure and a team. Just because you have stayed in top five-star hotels, doesn’t mean you know how to operate them.” Indeed.
