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Sunday Times, March 136, 2005
MINIMALIST icon the Hempel hotel has been purchased by a private Irish investor group, writes Kathy Foley. The 40-room boutique hotel in Bayswater, west London, was put on the market for £12.5m (€17.9m) in December with a further £4m sought for its 80-seat I-Thai restaurant and six apartments.
The hotel, which is in a converted row of Georgian townhouses, was originally designed by the former Bond girl-turned-designer Anouska Hempel.
Its previous owners, the UK-based property developers O&H Properties, purchased it in 2003 for a reported £10m from a Japanese property firm, AC Real Estate.
The Irish group is fronted by Michael McBride, who is to become the managing director of the hotel. McBride was formerly the general manager of Dublin’s Herbert Park hotel, owned by John Kennedy and the McSharry family of Manor-hamilton. He held the same position at Paramount Group’s Imperial hotel in Blackpool and Shrigley Hall in Cheshire.
Despite an annual turnover of £3.36m, the Hempel had an operating loss of £264,455 in the year ended 31 August 2004.