Hand Picked Hotels adds three properties

Country house hotel group Hand Picked Hotels has bought three properties to bring its portfolio up to 17.

The hotels are being acquired from the Bridgehouse Hotels Group for an undisclosed sum as part of a plan to expand the group to 20 properties across the UK by 2012.

The new additions are: Grade II listed 57-room Hendon Hall Hotel in Hendon, North London; Audleys Wood Hotel in Basingstoke, Hampshire, also Grade II listed and with 72 rooms; and New Hall Hotel, Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands, a Grade I listed 60-room hotel, 20 minutes from Birmingham airport.

Hendon Hall will provide the group with a North London presence and is close to Wembley Stadium and good motorway links.

Audleys Wood will give access to the key business markets along the M3 corridor.

New Hall in Sutton Coldfield will be in a position to service business in Birmingham and the West Midlands.

Julia Hands, who created Hand Picked Hotels in 2001 from a collection of hotels purchased with her husband, city financier Guy Hands, said: “Our aim is to have 20 hotels by 2012 in strategic positions across the UK and these three hotels are a great fit for our existing portfolio.

“They are trading well and have some beautiful features.  They will add 189 bedrooms to the existing 760 bedrooms in the group. The three properties, like all our hotels, are former private country houses with interesting histories.”

Bridgehouse Hotels managing director Alex Mackay said: “After huge success in turning these three ailing hotels into successful profitable businesses, we are pleased to be passing them on to a group with a similar passion for service and hospitality as Bridgehouse Hotels.”

More than £70 million has been invested in restoring and developing the existing 14 Hand Picked Hotels to stimulate growth in conferences, leisure, weddings and health clubs/spas.

Recent projects have been completed at Rookery Hall near Nantwich, Cheshire, where £10 million was spent on a new spa and health club, new banqueting and conference facilities, plus 39 additional rooms.

At Rhinefield House in the New Forest near Brockenhurst in Hampshire, a £4 million addition of conference facilities, health club and additional bedrooms has just been completed.

At Norton House, close to Edinburgh, £13 million has been spent on a new spa and health club, conference and banqueting facilities and 36 additional rooms.

by Phil Davies