I've been to the Walpole Bay Hotel and Museum before, so I decided to pop in for afternoon tea during my recent day trip to Margate, on my birthday.
We were very lucky as the owner of the hotel- a great British eccentric named Jane Bishop- was giving a very interesting talk about the history of the hotel, and her part in the restoration of it, to a group of old dears in the dining room just as we were having our tea. It's good that someone with no background in hotel management but a hell of a lot of passion has made a go of this business. It just goes to show that it's what's in the heart that counts, and just what drive and determination can do.
Our "Strawberry Tea" was lovely...
Here's SuperDean trying to be elegant... Not a great photo as he's very much in silhouette.
The dining room.
The veranda. This is a PDF as my picture didn't come out well.
Walking into this Art Deco hotel is like walking into an Agatha Christie script. The museum is not a room as such, but housed in unused sections of this working hotel. If you like oddities and eccentricities and an olde worlde atmosphere, then this is the ideal hotel for you. We also got to see inside some of the rooms and they were lovely, with really personal touches.
But if you like modern style hotels in what is considered to be 'good taste' (please, I am just not interested in 'tasteful'); neutral colours and clean, sleek lines (how infernally boring) then maybe this place is not for you.
Here is the entrance foyer with its trellis door lift. My block of flats in Hammersmith had one of these lifts so I am very familiar with them!
Here are a couple of fashion pics in the bridal suite. To me, they kind of summed up the shabby (in the nicest sense of the word) chic of the hotel.
Fashion dummies in the corridor.
Dressing up cupboard.
Gloves displayed behind a glass wall hanging.
This mad hat room is madder than a hatter!
Vanity mirrors like those our grandmothers owned.
The shoe room. It HURT to leave the pink shoes behind...especially as they were my size. My heart bleeds!
Teddy bears on display.
This room contained typewriters and sewing machines. Many people have donated curios to the museum.
If you're like me and love the unusual then you will certainly want to have a nose around this hotel.
Yes, it's junk, but it's interesting junk!
The beautiful ballroom in the basement.
The atmospheric lounge next to the ballroom. This photo is very dark- I didn't have enough battery power to turn the flash on! You do get a sense of louche decadence, though.
A PDF of the billiard room next to that. I love the Art Deco mirror- the whole hotel is a real nostalgia trip and takes you back in time to yesteryear.
Here's a weird selfie of me photographing a naked lady in one of the cabinets in the foyer. I've said this before but I always seem to be wearing this pink get-up whenever I'm in a photo. I'm sure you all think that I own only one set of clothes!
It has been said that the collection here needs "sorting out." Yep, maybe it does, but only a tweak here and there. I wouldn't want it to look too neat as I think that would take too much away from its charm.
There is also a napery display- where guests have drawn on linen napkins and given then back to be framed and put on the walls. These didn't interest me that much, although if I ever stay at the hotel I want to be given a napkin to draw on- and I want it displayed!
Here's local girl Tracey Emin's napkin, showing her portrait of the hotel owner. I'm not quite sure whether she should be flattered by this or not!
This is the view of the back of the theatre, taken as we walked away from the hotel and back to Margate beach.
All in all, 'twas a lovely day, filled with big smiles!!!!
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