Flat Cap Hotels secures funding to grow to five properties

Boutique group Flat Cap Hotels has announced it has received "significant" private investment to enable it to expand to five properties in the north west of England by 2019.

As a result, the company's plans to raise £250,000 via a crowdfunding campaign has been terminated, despite pledges of nearly £167,000.

Launched last year by third-generation hoteliers Oliver and Dominic Heywood, Flat Cap Hotels currently has one property, the 20-bedroom Vicarage Freehouse and Rooms in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire.

The new funding will pay for the launch of a second hotel within the converted Grade I-listed former Crown Court building in Knutsford, Cheshire. A 150-cover restaurant and function space for up to 550 guests in the Courthouse hotel will open in November, while 60 bedrooms will follow next year.

Future acquisitions for the group are expected to be within a 50-mile radius of Flat Cap's first property. A third hotel is due to be announced in the next few weeks.

Oliver Heywood, who combines his role in expanding Flat Cap Hotels with consultancy work at London-based property management company Cushman & Wakefield, said: "Dominic and I are overwhelmed by the support we've received in our first year at the Vicarage, and thrilled by the opportunity this investments opens up to Flat Cap Hotels."

The Heywood brothers, whose father Peter once owned the Belfry House in Handforth, and Old Hall hotel, Sandbach, intend to set up a Flat Cap management training programme and launch a competition to find an interior designer to work with the group. So far, the décor of the properties have been inspired by the Pig and Firmdale Hotels.

The motto of Flat Cap Hotels is "local food, local drink, local country living".

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