There is a secret part of me that has always dreamt of being the 'perfect' hostess, of my big house constantly brimming with people and yet, miraculously, never crossing the line from super-sociable to completely chaotic.
In fact, I live in an Arts and Crafts cottage with a modern bit stuck on the back. However, let us not get bogged down by details, for in 'my' big, comfortable, shabbily-chic (but more chic than shabby) house, replete with gorgeous acreage that looks not unlike the gardens of Great Dixter, I may be found chatting with a couple of my charming 'guests'... for, yes, in a parallel life I am actually the proprietor of a dreamy, upscale, seaside B&B.
I know, I really ought to get a grip. The only bit remotely based in fact is that I do actually live on the coast, in St Leonards-on-Sea, next door to Hastings in East Sussex. But the rest is pure, seductive, unfulfilled fantasy. At least, that is, until High Life ask me if I'd like to embrace the latest pop-up phenomenon (after the fashion for secret eateries in which gastronomes dine on restaurant-quality, pot-luck meals at private houses): the pop-up hotel.
It's simple — if you have a spare bedroom (tick), live somewhere people want to visit (tick) and aren't afraid to throw open your doors to a relative stranger (hmm, OK — tick!), then you can earn a bit of money at the same time as your guests expand their horizons.
It's all the rage: Azzedine Alaïa has opened a three-bed boutique hostelry in Paris, Lisbon boasts the minimal micasaenlisboa (micasaenlisboa.com), while London has the super-glamorous two-bed B&B, 40Winks (40winks.org), run by interior designer David Carter.
Elsewhere in the UK, sculptor Robert Hornyold-Strickland rents three rooms of his Georgian house in Bath to guests, who are also invited to watch him at work, and Scots knitwear designer Wallace Shaw has opened two rooms of his home within the imposing Leith Assembly Rooms` in Edinburgh. In Gwynedd, Ann Hughes runs the boutique seaside B&B, Llety Bodfor, where you can buy some of the objects you'll find in your room from her equally boutique boutique next door, and in Whitstable, the Front View gallery's owners, Julie Thorne and Tom Sutherland, last year diversified from selling contemporary photography to providing accommodation for, presumably, the kind of guests who appreciate a bit of contemporary photography.
I am totally with-the-programme: I live by the sea, my house is reasonably stylish (not to mention heaving with contemporary photography) and I love cooking. I haven't even been put off by Channel 4's recent Three in a Bed series, which did for B&Bs what Wife Swap did for 'happy' marriages.
Nonetheless, although pop-up hotel customers are usually acquaintances/old colleagues/friends of friends rather than completely unknown quantities, I cheat and opt for a soft opening for my hotel — the trade's description for easing oneself into a new business — and, a luxury not afforded most hoteliers, even go as far as choosing my own guests: one of my best friends, shoe designer Georgina Goodman (who is not only extremely stylish but also spends a lot of time in hotels for work and play and is therefore very discerning) and her eight-year-old daughter, Silva.
