"Arriving in Llandudno's sunny town centre - all handsome Victorian shopfronts and happy families - we were pleasantly surprised. We had been warned that it was massively twee. And it was, but in a good way: faded candy-coloured buildings line the seafront; a shop on the old pier sells coloured seashells (unfortunately, sourced from exotic foreign beaches) and the old-fashioned sweet shops aren't trendy nostalgia merchants - they just never went away.
As we walked to the Escape Boutique B&B, it dawned on us that there were B&Bs everywhere we looked. Most had sad-looking "Rooms Available" signs hanging on the door, and many looked like they hadn't seen a lick of paint since 1967. We later found out that there are 3,000 bed spaces in this town, so one would presume competition is stiff.
How wonderful it was, then, to walk past the sweet little tram station and turn into Church Walks to find a row of grand 18th-century merchants' houses, resplendent with raised front gardens and fancy hedges. And one of them was "ours".
We were warmly greeted by Andrew, the general manager, and shown around the beautiful building that had been thoughtfully restored five years ago. Until then, it was a house whose upstairs had been split into five student flats, while the landlords had lived downstairs.
The current owners, Sam and Gaenor Nayar, had seen potential in the building. Noticing the faded beauty of the oak panelling in the lounge and dining room, the original parquet flooring, the hand-carved fireplace, the stained glass windows, they just couldn't resist. They bought it and spent nine months restoring it to its former glory.
And what a job they have done. There are nine individually designed bedrooms, all decorated with original 1960s furniture sourced from antiques fairs and eBay. Conran love chairs, sleek mirrored wardrobes and even sleeker chrome light fittings all sit against a classic 18th-century backdrop without looking at all contrived. It works.
Our room had a beautiful view of the Llandudno hills - endless fields of green - a flat-screen television and a shower about the size of my London flat. Aveda toiletries lined the bathroom shelves and the huge bed, with soft pillows and crisp white sheets, meant that we fell asleep before we had the chance to watch the film we'd borrowed from Escape's extensive (and free) DVD library.
After a truly unsurpassable sleep, we made our way down to the dining room for a hearty, delicious two-course breakfast cooked by Sam, who came out afterwards for a chat and to ask what we had planned for the day. We talked about the town of Llandudno and about his slight frustration with other businesses in the area refusing to move with the times, and the credit crunch and how it's holding up their plans for expansion.
"I think our next venture will be a family B&B - somewhere that's stylish and spacious and offers more than just a fold-out bed for the kids, although the banks aren't giving much out in the way of money at the moment. I'm off to see the bank manager today, actually."
It's evident that Sam and Gaenor really love what they're doing: they have plans to expand the Escape brand - and their beautiful B&B is fully booked at the moment. With that, and although we certainly had no reason to run away, we set off on our walk to Conwy - a charming town steeped in medieval history, and about 13 miles away if you take the scenic route - while Sam set off for his meeting with the bank manager."
No comments:
Post a Comment