It's Tim who finds all the sites," says Kit Kemp of her husband as she sits down for lunch on the colourful banquette at Oscars, the dining room at the Charlotte Street Hotel and one of the four reputable restaurants that form part of their currently six-strong hotel group. "He cycles around town on his bicycle and spots empty sites with potential." Tim was not present at lunch as he is reputedly journalist-shy, which is perhaps one of the reasons that the couple have such an enigmatic aura in the hotel industry. They are not at every party, every award ceremony and every launch, but more likely to be plotting a new hotel or out in the countryside with their three teenage daughters and stable of horses.
When I did speak to Tim on the telephone he was generous with his time and answers to my questions and enthusiastic about his work. His most recent find in London is a John Nash-designed building located on the site of the former head offices of American Express on Suffolk Place next to the Haymarket Theatre Royal, which has as its back garden The National Gallery and Trafalgar Square. Due to open in the autumn of this year, Firmdale have taken three Georgian houses and commenced a complete rebuild of them that began in January 2005. "It will be realised as a 58 room hotel," explains Kit, "there will be a bar and a restaurant seating 100 covers and we are turning an old shooting gallery into a conference room. We are also creating a library and three luxury townhouses, as well as a swimming pool - with its own bar and lounge - and treatment rooms in the basement."
As in all their hotels, every room will be different and the unique touches throughout are all down to Kit, who is Firmdale's Design Director. "Please don't write that I don't have a formal design training," she asks. "Almost a quarter of a century spent in the business counts for something, I think." Indeed, Kit's work speaks for itself and she has received much media attention plus several awards including Luxury Briefing's Award of Excellence for outstanding contribution to British luxury goods and services. Her design work is a primary reason that the Firmdale Group has evolved at its own measured pace and grown with a loyal client base. Before Kit met Tim she was a shipping broker with a love of graphic design who grew up in Hampshire, where her father owned an espresso and jazz bar. Tim gave her the opportunity to test her artistic talents and now Kit oversees every element in every room of each hotel and does not have a large team of designers working under her, instead taking a hands-on approach to her work. "We only undertake one project at a time as that is simply all we can manage" explains Kit. "We have progressed slowly but steadily, and each hotel is a labour of love. We have never tried to brand ourselves and we are so strongly involved in the buildings we are working on that it could not be any other way. We try not to be an accountant's concern."
Tim echoes her sentiments: "We don't take an accountancy approach to hotels. For us it is the product that comes first. We like to give the rooms as much space as we can, even at the cost of 'keys'. As we are contractor and architect and builder and designer we can do what we like with our sites knowing that we are not going to sue ourselves for changing our mind half-way through a job."
The Kemps are in a privileged position. It is rare today to privately own an entire hotel chain. They do not have to answer to investors and the banks have learned to trust them as their projects have reaped successful financial rewards, with an annual turnover of £40 million. The Kemps are able to decide how they want to mould the properties that Tim acquires and Kit designs. Her keen eye for design and colour has been celebrated by others as well. "I liken our buildings to a Saville Row Suit," she commented, "and as with any bespoke products, we are not trying to be like anyone else." Kit designs much of the furniture for the hotels herself and commissions their manufacture. Every single room in each hotel is different, which is somewhat standard nowadays in design hotels, but Kit has been dedicating such energy to her projects since her first country-house-style hotel in London opened in Dorset Square in 1985.
"I love fabrics and I love colour," she responds when asked what drives her design. "The light in the UK is so dull and I am always aware that what I am creating is to be seen and used during four seasons in a year, so I want to make sure the spaces are cheery and fresh." Her style has naturally evolved over time: "I used to want to create English country-houses in the city, but my tastes changed and became more sophisticated. I went through a period where my designs were a modern take on traditional styles. Recently I have created fresh modern, yet always English, environments." Her love of contemporary art is also apparent throughout the hotels which feature work created especially to reflect the history of the buildings in which they are placed.
The Charlotte Street Hotel is located in a former dental warehouse and is in the heart of Bloomsbury. "When we acquired the site I started to spend time researching the area in the Victoria and Albert Museum. I came across an old copy of the Illustrated London News which featured works by the Bloomsbury Group. I went to local auctions and collected pieces by Roger Fry and Vanessa Bell which I have placed in this hotel. But I did not want the hotel to be a pastiche on the past; the intention was rather to acknowledge the potential for fine art in the home."
The mural that wraps the inner wall of Oscar's restaurant was inspired by the style of 1916 frescoes entitled "Scenes of Contemporary Life" by Roger Fry and his Omega workshop. It reflects the darker, dirtier colours that were fashionable during the Bloomsbury set's period. The drawing rooms are in the spirit of Bloomsbury painters Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant who were influenced by Matisse and some of the more colourful French painters of the time. There is a small bronze cat by Botero in the entrance, which Kit later emulated in The Soho Hotel when she placed an impressive ten-foot-high version by the reception. The Soho Hotel was another conversion, having a former life as an NCP car park which the Kemps turned into a 91 room hotel and filled with Kit's signature colour and more modern art including a Peter Clarke collage and a mural by Alexander Hollweg running the length of the bar, which is part of the Refuel restaurant.
Tim and Kit married in 1983 following an introduction by one of Kit's former boyfriends. Tim had "a classical education: Rugby and Oxford, after which I was expected to earn my own living". And earn it he did: in the 1970s he owned some 3500 bed-sits around London which he rented to students as one-star accommodation. He acquired the freeholds on these short leasehold properties and this became the springboard for the first Firmdale establishment as we know it today - Dorset Square in Marylebone, a London townhouse which was kitted out as an English country mansion and opened in 1985 but was sold in 2002. The formula worked and was followed by The Pelham Hotel in 1989. This South Kensington townhouse's design also started life as a luxury country-mansion but has evolved with Kit's style over the past decade and today reflects her modern English tastes. There are 52 bedrooms and suites and the house has been upgraded to include air-conditioning throughout and granite and mahogany bathrooms. Tim acknowledges that London hotels should answer the needs of their guests: "We don't wish to live in a vacuum and I am aware of trends and demands in the hospitality industry. Firmdale tries to provide our clients with what they want and the only way to do this is by listening to them". Durley House on Sloane Street came next, acquired in 1989 and structured as a series of private apartments with a concierge on the ground floor, before being sold in 2001.
The Covent Garden Hotel on Monmouth Street opened in 1996 and was previously the site of a French hospital although had been empty for some years. This was Firmdale's biggest restoration at the time and its transformation into a 58 bedroom and suite hotel is at once subtle and smart. The reception opens into a mature drawing room with Kit's quirky touches found in the furniture - some antique and some commissioned - and vivid upholstery. The Brasserie Max is a low-key eaterie with cosy nooks and corners. "This hotel is most popular with Californian show business visitors," Kit commented. "The reason is probably that it is a slightly unfashionable hotel as we kept it traditional but the rooms are large. It is not flashy, nor trying to be something it is not. We captured the right feel for a hotel of this size." Woody Allen would agree with her, having spent the summer of 2004 living there while he was in London to shoot his latest film 'Match Point'.
In 1997 Tim was negotiating for another site on Sloane Street but the deal fell through at the 11th hour and in his disappointment he cycled to the Covent Garden Hotel and took a stroll north to Charlotte Street. There he discovered an empty dental warehouse and enquiries led him to a 75-year-old fifth-generation owner who was familiar with Tim's other hotels and liked the idea that the space should become just another Firmdale hotel: "As the money was already in place for the building that I did not get, I was able to buy the building on Charlotte Street in 24 hours," Tim remembers. although it would take another three years for the hotel to open in June 2000. The Kemps are continuously updating, remodelling and tweaking their hotels. This is perhaps most apparent at Number Sixteen, which was purchased in 2000 as an operating bed-and-breakfast establishment.
"We managed to keep it open despite a slow refurbishment," explains Kit. The re-design took place over the following three years and resulted in 42 individually decorated bedrooms, each with their own hand embroidered bedspreads and linen made by Frette. There are two drawing rooms, a conservatory and garden at the rear of this white stucco Mid-Victorian terrace on Sumner Place in the heart of South Kensington.
The Knightsbridge Hotel opened in 2002 and located in the residential tree-lined Beaufort Gardens, is described by Kit as their "lower-end" hotel, referring to the single room rate of £150 per night. The Soho Hotel came next in September 2004 and immediately picked up awards as Tatler magazine's 'Most Glamorous Hotel in the World', and the 2004 Annual Wallpaper* Design Awards acknowledged it as having the 'Best Hotel Suite in the World' for its fifth floor Terrace Suite which spans some 1800ft2 and offers views across London's rooftops. It also has several lushly decorated meeting rooms including The Crimson Bar, an inviting library with open French fireplace, an honesty bar and a drawing room warmly rendered in pinks and greens. To reflect the needs of the neighbourhood Kit even managed to fit two screening rooms in the basement, one with bright red Poltrona Frau leather seats and walls lined in navy blue pinstriped men's suit wool,the other with ponyskin Poltrona Frau armchairs and walls upholstered in charcoal pinstriped wool.
"The Soho Hotel is the hotel in our group that is most popular with the film world," comments Kit on the client demographic the different hotels attract. "We have noticed that each hotel is popular with a particular guest type. The Charlotte Street guest is predominantly media and advertising which reflects the businesses in that area. Covent Garden is specifically Hollywood show-biz who, I think, are looking for anonymity in London. The Pelham is popular with fine old gentleman, Knightsbridge is loved by ladies who are in town to shop and Number Sixteen's patrons are people who work in the city a few days every week and are paying their own expenses."
The Kemps maintain a very personal approach across the group, an element of which is reflected by the awareness they have of the nature of their guests and how to accommodate those requirements. This constant attention to detail was also recognised by British industry when the Queen personally presented Firmdale Hotels the Queen's Award for Enterprise for its outstanding contribution to international trade. "Somehow we are seen as being a quintessentially English hotel group," notes Kit. "When people come here from abroad they enjoy our English references." This has resulted in an opportunity to export the Firmdale formula to New York. "We have found a site in SoHo and I can't say more than that, other than it will be located on the most fashionable street in SoHo," commented Tim. The leap from London to New York makes sense when you realise that 39% of the Kemp's clients are from the USA (the breakdown ranges from 28% at Charlotte Street to 44% at Covent Garden).
"Recently we have expanded with a new hotel about every two years," Kit acknowledged. New York will open in 2008. "Tim was born with the drive to achieve this and I find that men are good with spaces and women are good at filling them." The Firmdale formula has worked well in London and will doubtless be a winner in this other world city as well.
www.firmdale.com
