You will note that my title for this review states that the Garden House Hotel WAS a good hotel. So why is the word WAS in capitals?
Well, Ciao is a little out dated as this hotel actually burnt down in 1999!
The Hotel
I was born and brought up in Folkestone, Kent and remember this hotel as one of the grand old Victorian buildings that used to dominate my home town before the property developers moved in and turned us into a concrete jungle. Folkestone is a seaside town on the South East coast of England. It is around 70 miles from London and around 16 miles from the city of Canterbury. The cross
Channel port of Dover is approximately 7 miles along the coast. Folkestone was a very popular holiday destination from the time of Queen Victoria.
The Garden House Hotel stood in it's own small grounds, literally a garden, but a very pretty, well maintained garden filled with old fashioned English flowers and plants such as roses,hollyhocks, lupins and delphiniums all growing in neat beds amid manicured lawns. There was also a huge old pear tree which local children tried year after year to pinch the fruit from! The hotel itself was painted white and green, it was extremely attractive and had an old world charm. In the grounds there was a little cottage built as a miniature replica of the Hotel, which was, I believe used as living accommodation for members of the hotel staff.
The hotel stood on Sandgate Road, the main road which runs along the coast from the Cinque Port town of Hythe to Folkestone. This was a prime location for visitors and they could access the main road system easily if they wished to explore the area by car. Hotel guests could wander by foot into the shopping areas of town or take the antique cliff side funicular lift down to the beach. Although a rather expensive hotel, The Garden House was ever popular.
The Garden House hotel was open to non residents and had a small night-club/music bar in the basement. As a (slightly) wild teenager in the 70's, my friends and I would go to the Garden House cellar bar and consider ourselves very sophisticated as we sang along to live rock or folk groups and sipped our beers from the bottle.....times have changed, I'm now a tee total grandmother to three!! As I matured and my tastes became more refined, my ex husband and I used to visit the Garden House Hotel for dinner regularly. A finely decorated dining room served wonderful food and the staff were well trained and efficient.
The hotel was also used for social functions, my cousin had her wedding reception at the hotel and our family hired several rooms for visiting relatives to use. I was fortunate enough to see my cousins hotel room and it was amazing, a huge room with a massive four poster bed, beautiful décor, thick carpets and wonderful antique furniture, a real bridal suite!
The Fate of the Hotel
Sadly the Garden House Hotel is no more, I remember the day it burnt down because my daughter who was about 6 months pregnant at the time, lived in a flat close to the hotel. We lived in a village on the hills overlooking Folkestone and had a panoramic view of the town. My daughter was visiting my partner and I for lunch and as we gazed out over the town, we became aware of a plume of thick black smoke rising from the town. My partner fetched a pair of binoculars and noted that the smoke was coming from the Sandgate Road area. My poor daughter was worried that the fire was near her home, so we made some phone calls and were reassured that although the roads were closed to allow the fire brigade to do their stuff, my daughter's home was safe. She was unable to return to her home until the next day as the fire had really taken a hold and the streets were impassable.
The following day, when we took my daughter home, we were devastated to see The Garden House Hotel in ruins. The fire had apparently started in a store room, the cause was faulty electrical wiring and being such an old building, the fire had rapidly spread. The roof had been burned away completely and the whole place was enveloped in a foul smoky smell. The building finally had to be demolished as it was beyond repair.
The land that The Garden House Hotel stood on was eventually cleared and purchased by a property developer who built a block of apartments especially for older people. They are a typical modern building, not unpleasant, but lacking in character.
The grand and elegant Garden House Hotel is sadly missed and it gave me quite a jolt to discover it was listed on Ciao.
I hope my memories have been entertaining, I just wish I had some pictures of the hotel that I could post here for readers to see.
Please ignore the specific criteria as the Hotel is no longer in existance and it goes without saying really that I would not recommend it to a friend!!!!
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