Growing the Gilpin Hotel and Lake House

18 May 2022 by

The Gilpin Hotel and Lake House in the Lake District has expanded from a tiny B&B to a sprawling country hotel with further growth ahead

John and Christine Cunliffe started their journey at Gilpin Lodge in 1988, in a house once owned by John's grandmother. The story that follows is one of evolution, led by John and Christine and more recently developed by their sons, Barney and Ben, along with managing director Karen Baybutt.

Baybutt arrived at the beginning of a burst of expansion at the property, now called the Gilpin Hotel and Lake House. Gilpin Spice, the casual dining restaurant with two AA rosettes serving tapas-style pan-Asian dishes had opened only six months prior, following the appointment of executive chef and food and beverage manager Hrishikesh Desai in March 2015.

Since Baybutt joined five more spa suites have been added to the hotel and she is currently overseeing the build of another accessible one. Gilpin Spice is also being expanded, with a new bar and outdoor south-facing terrace, and additional spa treatment rooms above the restaurant.

Baybutt is managing the build and opening of a third restaurant at the Lake House, and re-siting and upgrading an onsite laundry and bio-mass facility that provides heated water for the rooms and hot tubs, generating a significant saving on energy costs.

Family ties at the Gilpin

Baybutt is new to hospitality, having previously been a partner in supply company Alan Baybutt & Sons, and joined the Gilpin as financial controller but was quickly promoted to financial director and subsequently managing director in June 2021. She is a member of the Gilpin board, which includes Christine Cunliffe and her two sons Ben (of Ben Cunliffe Architects) and Barney and his wife Zoe, who is also responsible for the hotel's PR and marketing.

Baybutt is considered part of the Gilpin family, with Barney describing her as "the missing cog". She herself attributes her success to the family ethos and the mentoring she received from John Cunliffe up until his death in May 2020.

"We have an incredible executive team here, and we all work very closely together to keep John's ethos alive. The board team sets the strategy, and the executive team implements it with the heads of department and other team members supporting the strategy," she says. "We're still very much influenced by the family, which is important, and we like our staff and guests to feel part of that family too.

"Doing what's important to the family is crucial as it's never not going to be a family business. I just must make sure it's run efficiently and effectively. I maintain the quality of the experience and deliver the ‘love and laughter' – that's our mantra here – as well as meeting the expectations of our guests."

She has full financial responsibility in terms of commercial targets, and although each department has its own budget, and the Lake House is a separate legal entity, it falls under her remit The Gilpin's future strategy is to continue expanding the spa facilities in line with the growth in the UK staycation and leisure market and as such the hotel has just installed hot tubs outside all its junior garden suites, which always sell first. "If we guarantee these rooms alone, we will always have 75% occupancy," she says.

The wider wellbeing approach would not be complete without exploration of the stunning Lake District countryside, and guests are encouraged to walk many local trails and visit the nearby town of Bowness-on-Windermere.

The hotel's ‘mini-moons' are especially popular, a three-day package with spa treatments and products, food and a boat trip on Lake Windermere. Their clientele are mostly couples who tend to stay onsite, taking advantage of the facilities.

"Our demographic has changed over the last few years, and we are getting a younger clientele coming in," says Baybutt. "Gilpin Spice is also attracting a younger crowd, but we still have a high percentage of long-term and loyal returning guests."

The hotel and Lake House have both been busy since reopening in July 2021 after lockdown and, despite considerable damage from storm Arwen in November and a week of no electricity, the team got stuck in.

"We had a lounge full of unexpected guests bedded down with quilts and candles. Now, looking back on it, I guess it was a great training exercise and showed us how well the team coped in an emergency. It was like that all through Covid – we've all done jobs in different departments and turned our hands to everything."

Facing the staffing crisis

Like everyone else in the industry, the hotel and Lake House are experiencing challenges recruiting staff, particularly at a junior level.

"We haven't had our European workers back, which equalled around 40% of seasonal staff previously, and although we've got good retention at head of department level, housekeeping is always a difficult department to keep fully staffed," says Baybutt.

"We've split the teams into property areas across the locations, such as the spa suites, spa lodges, laundry and evening turn-down.

Baybutt's solution to the staffing issue is to ensure her team's jobs are made easier and more efficient. For example, kitchen porters have benefitted from high-tech pot-washing machines and new buggies to quickly get around the compound. The staff canteen, managed by Gilpin Spice head chef Paul Webster, fondly named ‘Webbo's Bistro', is a huge perk for staff. The business has invested heavily in internal training programmes and pay scales are based on continuing self development. Work-life balance has been addressed with flexible contracts and versatile shift patterns, and there are rooms for 40 members of the team in nearby staff accommodation, as well as regular social gatherings on- and off-site.

"Having a Michelin star is obviously also a huge draw to attract chefs, but sometimes we struggle there, too – it's now a much smaller pond to fish from," she states.

The business has a 47% wage bill, which, says Barney, is reflective of the measures that have been necessary to continue to attract staff, such as bonus schemes, pay rises and increased pension and National Insurance costs. Baybutt says: "Streamlining efficiencies and investing in initiatives that will save us money is going to be crucial."

The Gilpin has evolved, and as owner John Cunliffe wrote in his book Slightly Perfect, which honours the Lake District "and hotels as places to be enjoyed," the evolution continues as he so wisely knew it would.

Meet chef Hrishikesh Desai

Hrishikesh Desai always knew he wanted to be an executive chef at a country house hotel, but achieving his ambition wasn't quite that straightforward.

The chef was classically trained at the Institute Paul Bocuse in Lyon before working at the Mercure Box Hill Burford Bridge hotel in Dorking and Lucknam Park Hotel & Spa in Chippenham for 10 years. However, he soon found that he faced problems when trying to move on.

"I applied for various jobs and received multiple rejections," he says. "It became obvious very quickly that the rejections were due to the spices I use in my cooking, my food philosophy and my desire to introduce these spices into modern British cuisine. As soon as I mentioned chilli or ginger to the owners and managing directors, they'd say ‘do you think our customers will like this?' I had six rejections and I went into my shell. I lost a lot of confidence."

Then, in 2015, he was encouraged to enter Alex Polizzi's Chefs on Trial TV programme, a competition where Polizzi found new executive chefs for hotels. Hywel Jones, executive chef at Lucknam Park, encouraged Desai to compete for the role of head chef at Gilpin. "I didn't want to enter the competition, but I was talked round, and the skills I'd learned at Lucknam helped me go on to win," he says.

In the final of the show Desai was tasked with writing recipes for the Gilpin team. "That's where my experience at Lucknam came into its own, having worked in the Michelin-starred Restaurant Hywel Jones, in the brasserie and the cookery school. I was able to give very clear instructions and I had the confidence to present in front of an audience. I'd spent two years being an entertainer, a teacher and an organiser at the cookery school, and these skills helped develop my personality."

After he took up the role, he and the hotel family set about changing the style of food across the estate. "My first mission was to cook food that made sense, as well as maintain three AA rosettes. I then had to train the team in my style in terms of flavour."

The first couple of reviews following his appointment told him he was playing it safe. Then, lauded chef Ken Hom came to stay. "He tasted my food, a classic dish, and he asked for fresh red chilli to be chopped on top! I had 15 minutes with him – speaking in French, which was delightful – and he said: "Do what you do and do what you think is right". He boosted my confidence and I knew I had to be true to myself.

"We started boosting the spices, introduced amuse bouche and pre-desserts, and then in late 2015 and early 2016 we had three Michelin inspections. When I got the call to say we'd won our Michelin star, I couldn't move, I was literally rooted to the spot."

And Desai's brigade hasn't stopped pushing the boundaries since. Desai has taken trips with Barney and his family to China, Singapore, southern India, Malaysia and Thailand, to create a food strategy incorporating local and seasonal food, and Desai has completed a stage at Thomas Keller's French Laundry in California as part of his Roux Scholarship prize.

"We've been able to explore all these different cuisines. Spices and sauces are my strength, that's for sure, but then we all work together to refine the dishes," he says.

Opening HRiSHi at the Gilpin in 2016 allowed the team to concentrate on fine dining, with a more relaxed dining style offered at Gilpin Spice, which was awarded two rosettes six months after opening. Critics have classified Gilpin Spice as ‘desi-Chinese', "which was exactly what we were aiming for," says the chef. "We'd like three rosettes at Gilpin Spice now to sit alongside our Michelin plate."

"Naming the restaurant after me was Barney's idea. I wasn't keen and you'll never find my name on my jacket either, but renaming it did allow me to refocus the style of food; the best of the best Cumbrian produce with a twist of Asia and India. We continue to refine the dishes and more recently I've been looking back at some of my childhood memories, for example: the Tal Baji, Pav Bhaji or bread vegetable curry, a dish from Mumbai market created from leftover bread and vegetables. The team, including his head chef Owen Steeley, are concentrating on refining the d ishes. A pigeon dish that originally included smoked onions, burnt onions, various purées and apples in various forms has been pared back and now consists of a hand-made pigeon sausage, a pigeon breast, a sauce, and a couple of apple batons. "Simplicity," says Desai.

Desai is now working on a third restaurant at the property, designed to create more choice for guests. It will be a classic British brasserie where guests will choose one each from a selection of proteins, sides and sauce. "Again," says Desai, "simple but properly done."

Construction of the new restaurant has started at the Lake House and a new brigade is being put together to manage functions, weddings and events under the watchful eye of Lake House manager Tom Hatfield, Desai and Baybutt.

Award-winning ways

From its humble beginnings as a four-bedroom bed and breakfast, the Gilpin has accrued many accolades, the most recent being the AA's supreme accolade for hotels, five red stars, recognising it as one of the best hotels in the British Isles, offering excellent levels of quality throughout, and outstanding levels of hospitality and service.

"It was fantastic to receive five red stars," says Baybutt. "It was emotional too, because it was something that the family had strived for, and poignant because John was not with us when the award was announced. To get it in a Covid year too…. you sort of operate and you just do it, and to be able to get the red stars after so many hurdles is testament to every single member of staff. We were all very proud."

Desai himself won the Roux Scholarship in 2019, the National Chef of the Year competition in 2020 and The Caterer's Chef of the Year Award in 2021.

"That was a big one for me," he says. "It was emotional. Chef of the Year is a big award, especially when you look at who has won in the past. It's not just an award given to you because you've been nominated, you must work very hard for it. I enjoyed winning it, because I knew it meant I had really achieved everything and that I believed in myself."

So what's next for him, the Gilpin and the Cunliffe family? "What we must do now is continue to develop the business. I love this profession. When I was in India, we used to see copies of The Caterer and in France I watched Great British Menu, and then when I started working in the UK, I was introduced to the Craft Guild of Chefs. I've met some incredible people during my career, and I've always wanted to be part of the wider UK hospitality industry. So now I think that if I can do it, why can't I help others achieve their dreams too?"

On the tasting menu

  • Croustade of Cumbrian beef tartar, smoked potato foam
  • Spiced pickled aubergine cornetto, Longley Farm's goats' cheese mousse, red pepper gel
  • English asparagus, aged Parmesan, spring truffle
  • Domain de Lanvaux duck liver, cherries, jalapeño
  • Cornish lobster, chartreuse, sambar
  • Udale's salt-aged Creedy Carver duck
  • Blood orange: orange and almond cake, set vanilla cream, sesame seed tuile, blood orange sorbet
  • Valrhona 70% dark chocolate: dark chocolate delice, banana bread, spiced panna cotta, caramelised chocolate Namelaka, milk sorbet

About Gilpin hotel

Gilpin Hotel & Lake House, Crook Road, Windermere, Cumbria LA23 3NE

thegilpin.co.uk

Number of rooms 28

Room rates From £295 per night B&B

Managing director Karen Baybutt

Executive chef and food and beverage manager Hrishikesh Desai

Operations manager Jo Selby

Estate manager Cameron Chapman

House manager Sarah Redmayne

Marketing executive Anna-Maria Dunne

Lake House manager Tom Hatfield

HR executive Ruth Sowerby

Continue reading

You need to be a premium member to view this. Subscribe from just 99p per week.

Already subscribed?

The Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email

Start the working day with The Caterer’s free breakfast briefing email

Sign Up and manage your preferences below

Check mark icon
Thank you

You have successfully signed up for the Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email and will hear from us soon!

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.

close

Ad Blocker detected

We have noticed you are using an adblocker and – although we support freedom of choice – we would like to ask you to enable ads on our site. They are an important revenue source which supports free access of our website's content, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.

trade tracker pixel tracking