Business
Escape to Ayrshire G
Jill Chalmers tells Katherine Price about repositioning historic Glenapp Castle into a destination hotel through an extensive activities programme and the addition of Scotland’s most luxurious suite
lenapp Castle in Ballantrae, Ayrshire, will join some of the world’s most luxu- rious hotels when it is featured in BBC
television show Amazing Hotels: Life Beyond the Lobby, next week. Presenters Rob Rinder and Monica Galetti
have already gone ‘beyond the lobby’ of venues including Kasbah Tamadot in Morocco’s Atlas Mountains, Nusfjord Arctic Resort in Norway, and Joali Maldives, and as managing director of the only UK hotel to be featured this sea-
24 | The Caterer | 15 September 2023
son, Jill Chalmers is looking forward to see- ing what makes the final cut. But it has taken many years to transform the 21-bedroom prop- erty into the amazing hotel it is today. The 110-acre Glenapp Estate had been well established under the Earl of Orkney when industrialist James Hunter acquired it and commissioned the construction of the Scot- tish baronial castle in 1870, in which the hotel now sits, combining Gothic and Renaissance touches as well as sandstone battlements, tur-
rets and towers. Over time, the property fell into disrepair, until the McMillan family of hoteliers purchased it in 1994 and spent six years restoring the dilapidated castle and gar- dens and turning the venue into a luxury hotel. The hotel was acquired by its current own-
ers, Paul and Poppy Szkiler, in 2015, Paul being the chief executive of private equity fund management business Truestone. Jill Chalmers joined the business two years later, having previously worked at Scandic Hotels
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