This rich part of hospitality history stretches back centuries
To begin at the beginning: I am standing somewhere in a field in Hampshire, using all my powers of imagination to conjure the distant past. For here, courtesy of the Romans, is where hospitality in Britain began. I am at Silchester, once the Roman town of Calleva Atrebatum, and close to the south gate stood a mansio [sic], an early form of inn for visiting dignitaries found in Roman settlements, with individual heated rooms around a courtyard.
The hospitality industry came into being for the simple reason that travellers needed shelter and sustenance and this, for centuries, was its primary role. But in modern times, post Industrial Revolution, a great change has taken place. We still need resting places while we travel from A to B, but we are just as happy to make special journeys to specific hotels that have become destinations in themselves. In tracing the history of hotels, we can also trace the social history of our country.
The mansio at Calleva Atrebatum even had its own bathhouse, a sign of its importance. If you want a flavour of Roman sophistication, head for modern-day hotel the Newt (thenewtinsomerset.com), where owner Koos Bekker has reconstructed a stunning Roman villa that once stood on the estate.
By 410 AD, the Romans had departed, and with them all provision for travellers. In the ensuing centuries, shelter for travellers was only available at monasteries, though there were plenty of alehouses along the way – among them the Old Ferry Boat Inn in St Ives (greenekinginns.co.uk) and the Porch House in Stow-on-the-Wold (porch-house.co.uk), which both claim to be the oldest pub in England.
The population swelled, trade swelled, and there were pilgrims aplenty. The need for lodging was greater than monasteries could provide and the first commercial inns came into being. The earliest, such as the Star at Alfriston (thepolizzicollection.com), then part of Battle Abbey and now a classy hotel owned by mother and daughter Olga and Alex Polizzi, offered lodging to pilgrims, but by the 14th and 15th centuries, secular inns, usually galleried around a courtyard, began to proliferate and were centres of commerce as well as lodging houses.
The Blue Boar at Leicester, where Richard III slept the night before his demise at the Battle of Bosworth, no longer exists, but there are plenty of other inns with their roots in the 15th century that are still trading and full of character today: the George Inn at Norton St Philip (butcombe.com), the Shaven Crown at Shipton-under-Wychwood (theshavencrown.co.uk), the Mermaid Inn at Rye, a smugglers’ inn (mermaidinn.com), the Crown at Chiddingfold (thecrownchiddingfold.com), the Fleece Inn at Bretforton (thefleeceinn.co.uk) and Sign of the Angel at Lacock (signoftheangel.co.uk) to name but a few.
The Old Bell Hotel at Malmesbury (oldbellhotel.co.uk), purpose-built as a guest house for monks visiting Malmesbury Abbey, is said to be Britain’s oldest hotel.
In the medieval period, hospitality was also available at large feudal manor houses, but the practice declined, as did hospitality offered by the monasteries after the dissolution.
Travelling was still mostly on foot or on horseback (Queen Elizabeth notably disliked riding in a carriage) and roads were rough, but the country prospered, the arts flourished and English renaissance drama was established in the courtyard of inns, whose surrounding balconies were occupied by the audience. As well as theatre, bear-baiting and cockfighting were popular attractions.
There were several notable Tudor inns on London’s Southbank, and a fine example where you can stay today is the Feathers Hotel in Ludlow (feathersatludlow.co.uk).
Coaches had been struggling along deplorably neglected roads since the early 16th century, pausing at inns along the way, but it was the introduction of regular stagecoach services in the 17th and 18th centuries that made coaching inns proliferate at manageable intervals along the routes that criss-crossed Britain.
Existing inns built of timber and plaster were re-faced in brick and stone, and new inns sprang up. Many coaching inns still make fine places to stay, although behind their Georgian facades, the warrens of rooms along creaky corridors have proved challenging for modern-day hoteliers.
Three favourites are the Spread Eagle Hotel & Spa at Midhurst (hshotels.co.uk), where the Earl of March stagecoach left every morning for London at 10am; the George of Stamford (georgehotelofstamford.com), where the famous gallows stretching across the street outside, proclaiming the hotel’s name, was erected as both a welcome to the honest traveller and a warning to highwaymen; and the Inn at Whitewell (innatwhitewell.com), where the peaceful setting must have been a boon to travellers braving the robber-infested Trough of Bowland that leads to it. But there are many others where contemporary comfort mixed with a sense of history and timelessness make a cheerful and atmospheric blend.
The zenith of the coaching inn was the first half of the 19th century. More than simply a resting place for travellers, where horses and carriages could also be hired, they were the social centres of the town – and their owners were often well educated, wealthy and well to do.
Many inns, both new and existing, took on an elegant and stately look, with assembly rooms on the first floor. Some called themselves hotels and were distinguished from inns by the fact that they offered no communal dining room, but private suites for each guest.
In London during the Regency period, private hotels sprang up – Byron wrote from an address in St James’s; Lord Nelson stayed in several; and Louis XVIII was housed in Grillion’s in Albemarle Street before his return to France. On the corner of Brook and Davies Streets, Mivart’s was established, later becoming Claridge’s (claridges.co.uk). It was used by visiting royalty and even by the Prince Regent himself, who had a suite of rooms permanently reserved for him.
The Connaught (the-connaught.co.uk), still with an air of quiet seclusion, began life as the Coburg in honour of the Prince Consort’s family. Another address, which opened in 1837 and has stayed with us to this day, is Brown’s Hotel (roccofortehotels.com), now owned by Rocco Forte, brother of Olga Polizzi.
The railways changed everything. As coaching declined in favour of iron horses, so did many inns. Hotels now advertised – in the words of one Bristol establishment – not only “every comfort for families, with coffee and commercial rooms… baths, warm, cold, vapour in the house” but “omnibuses to and from every train”.
Soon large hotels, purpose-built by the railway companies, were rising up at stations and they continued to do so for the next 80 years. Among many, they included the Grosvenor at Victoria (now the Clermont; theclermont.co.uk) in 1862; the Midland Grand (now the St Pancras Renaissance; marriott.co.uk) in 1873 and the Balmoral in Edinburgh (also now part of Rocco Forte; roccofortehotels.com) in 1902.
“End of the line” hotels, built purely for holidaymakers, were established, too: Slieve Donard in Northern Ireland (slievedonardhotel.com) opened in 1898 and the art deco Midland at Morecambe (inncollectiongroup.com) in 1933. In 1924, the Caledonian Railway commissioned Gleneagles in Scotland (gleneagles.com), constructing its own railway line and station to reach it.
The Langham (langhamhotels.com), which opened in London in 1865, is cited as Europe’s first grand hotel, its opening being attended by the Prince of Wales. Other addresses came and went, and it wasn’t until the advent, in 1889, of the Savoy (thesavoylondon.com) that London’s greatest grande dame hotel was created, opened by Richard D’Oyly Carte, managed by César Ritz, with food orchestrated by Auguste Escoffier. What a team. Ritz went on to open his own eponymous London hotel in 1906 (theritzlondon.com), doing more in his time to define luxury hotels than any other.
This was the heyday of grand London hotels, frequented by movie stars, millionaires and royalty. In the countryside there were inns; in fashionable seaside resorts there were seafront hotels, but it wasn’t until shortly after the war that a new breed, still going strong, was invented: the country house hotel.
In 1949, two gentlemen, Francis Coulson and Brian Sack, opened Sharrow Bay (now closed) in Cumbria. Looking for rest and recuperation, guests went there for nothing more than the view across Ullswater and the abundant hospitality of its owners. So shockingly new was their concept that people struggled to put a name to it, until one day when asked again exactly what Sharrow Bay was, Coulson replied: “It’s a country house that’s a hotel” – a literal description that spawned a genre that became a phenomenon.
In 1978, another new genre of hotel that has stood the test of time was born: Anouska Hempel’s sultry and sexy Blakes in London is cited as the first boutique establishment. A few years later, budget chains made their appearance, beginning with Travelodge in 1985 and Premier Inn in 1987; they too have stood the test of time.
Today, the hotel landscape is largely settled. No completely new types of hotel have emerged; only versions of each existing type, the best of them subtly evolving to match the ever-changing preferences and requirements of guests.
Spas, of course, have become hugely popular and many an existing country house hotel has had spa facilities tacked on, while newer ones, such as Lime Wood (limewoodhotel.co.uk), Dormy House (dormyhouse.co.uk), Thyme (thyme.co.uk) and Soho Farmhouse (sohohouse.com) opened with gorgeous ready-made spas.
With billionaire owners in the background, there is no shortage of new luxury hotels, both in London (Raffles at the Old War Office and the Peninsula next to Hyde Park to name but two due this year) and further afield. Budget hotel chains range from the disastrous (Britannia) to the excellent (Premier Inn), while the mid-market remains less focused.
Certainly, the Pig hotels (thepighotel.com) have done a huge amount to create desirable yet affordable places to stay, and their strong emphasis on rural living has been well-timed – watch out in the future for hotels that are all about sustainability, with wild-swimming ponds replacing energy-hungry spa pools.
Meanwhile, automated service and AI seem bound to make an entrance, especially in light of the difficulty so many hotels are facing in terms of staffing shortages. But despite all the challenges for the modern-day hotelier – yesterday’s innkeeper – the desire to be hospitable remains as strong as ever and the British have, for 2,000 years since Roman times, been past masters at the art.
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Explore hotels that have been tried, tested and rated by our experts