Brief lives: the bar and restaurants at Birch Selsdon overlook 200 acres of North Downs parkland. The venue had only been open since April
By STEVEN DOWNES
Birch Selsdon, the former Selsdon Park Hotel which reopened earlier this year after an 18-month, multi-million makeover that transformed it into a “shabby chic” lifestyle venue with top-end, and expensive, restaurants, is to close its doors for a final time tonight.
Around 100 staff will lose their jobs, after administrators who were appointed earlier this month failed to find buyers for the business as a going concern.
Many of the casual staff at the £220 per night hotel had already been let go. Some who remain have had to learn quickly to multi-task: the gardener has been staffing reception in the past week. Out of work less than a month before Christmas, it seems very unlikely that any staff will receive any redundancy pay from the failed business.
Shabby chic: the BIrch overhaul brought a touch of fashionable Shoreditch to Selsdon
Staff who spoke to Inside Croydon were close to, or in, tears.
The administrators had promised an update by last Friday, but when no news emerged, sources at the hotel began to fear the worst.
A statement was posted on hotel’s website today.
It says: “Milan Vuceljic and Andrew Pear of Moorfields Advisory were appointed Joint Administrators of Selsdon Estates Op Co Limited on 17 November 2023.
“The affairs, business and property of the company are being managed by the Joint Administrators. The Joint Administrators and their staff act as agents of the company and without personal liability.
“We regret to inform you that the Joint Administrators have taken the difficult decision to close the hotel with immediate effect.
“We appreciate this is disappointing news and apologise for the obvious distress and disruption to our members, guests, suppliers and the employees.”
The business owners, Aprirose, had bought the De Vere Selsdon Estate in a multi-million-pound deal in 2021. They closed the hotel and the adjoining golf club that November, and the hotel was closed for refurbishment throughout 2022, through to April this year.
But behind the scenes, there were problems, and cashflow issues. The Birch founder, entrepreneur Chris King, quit the business earlier this year, even before the Selsdon opened.
Pumping iron: members paid £150 per month, plus a £300 joining fee, to use the Birch facilities, such as the weight machines and gym
According to a report by The Caterer, the business ran into difficulty due to “cash constraints”. The first Birch hotel, in Cheshunt, was closed two weeks ago.
Birch Selsdon had three bars and two restaurants, Elodie and Vervain, which were managed by Michelin-starred chef, Lee Westcott. Observer restaurant critic, Jay Rayner, on a visit in the last few weeks, was very complimentary about the food. “The terrific cooking here seriously deserves a tidier, snazzier setting,” Rayner wrote.
Birch operated largely on a membership basis, and Selsdon had attracted around 700 since it opened in May, using its gym, “wellness centre”, lido, grounds and work spaces.
“I loved it,” one Birch Selsdon member told Inside Croydon.
Administrative measures: the terse letter sent to Birch staff two weeks ago
“Yeah, some restaurant staff were from the agencies and inexperienced, but there were also the best mixologists and hospitality staff I’d ever seen. Michelin-quality food and a really welcoming atmosphere. Definitely the most down to earth members club I’d been to, and quite a few areas open to the public to try.
“I’m so sad this is closing. I wish more was done to give it a real chance.”
Birch Selsdon’s members (£150 per hipster per month, or £280 per month for a job lot of two) received an email yesterday stating that the venue would be closed to them from midnight tonight, November 29.
Perhaps £100,000 of members’ subscriptions for December would not be a big enough cash injection to keep the hotel operating for another month?
Long-held fears that the heritage 19th Century building and its surrounding 200 acres of parkland might be under threat of redevelopment and possibly used for housing will now re-emerge.
Stunning views: there’s well-placed anxiety about what is to become of the 19th Century hotel buildings and grounds
The business’s creditors have certainly begun to emerge, with one contractor who worked on the maintenance and design of the building claiming to be owed more than £6,000 in unpaid invoices by the hotel.
Inside Croydon has also seen a letter from administrator Vuceljic at Moorfields that warned that, “No member of staff may speak to the press or other media…”, whatever that’s supposed to mean, “… without my express prior consent.”
The letter outlined the administrator’s role, who would oversee all purchase orders and raising of sales invoices and the banking and handling of cash and credit card transactions.
The administrator also demanded to sanction all “acceptance of goods inwards not ordered by us or our representatives”, a stricture which may have made operating the restaurants, with daily fresh food deliveries, more than a little awkward.
“Please also note that all credit accounts operated by the company have now been cancelled and that all credit cards should be returned to my staff immediately.” Which will have made operating stock for the bars and the restaurants impossible.
But at least not everyone missed out.
Back in May, one of the first guests for dinner was none other than Croydon’s Mayor, Jason Perry.
He nabbed a meal for four (four, no less! Lucky fella). His official declarations failed to identify which of the restaurants he and his pals dined in. If it was Vervain, they might have enjoyed beef sirloin for £36, or pork belly for £19, or a chicken salad for £16 (though, by repute, Mayor Perry is a bit of a salad dodger).
All possibly plus starters (around £14 a pop) or a dessert. There may even have been drinks. Cheers!
Mayor Perry did not pay for his “dinner for four people” at Birch on May 6, but he estimated it cost… a mere £100.
Let’s hope Perry left a generous tip, at his own expense.
Read more: Administrators move in to run Selsdon’s ‘shabby chic’ hotel
Read more: Lots of reservations after Selsdon hotel and golf course close
Read more: Get orf moy laaand! Posh hotel declares parkland a no-go zone
- Inside Croydon – as seen on TV! – has been delivering local community news since 2010. 3million page views per year in 2020, 2021 and 2022.
- If you want real journalism, actually based in the borough, you should consider paying for it. Please sign up today. Click here for more details
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
As featured on Google News Showcase
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content
Inside Croydon is a member of the Independent Community News Network
- Inside Croydon works together with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, as well as BBC London News and ITV London
ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: Croydon was named among the country’s rottenest boroughs for a SIXTH successive year in 2022 in the annual round-up of civic cock-ups in Private Eye magazine
Nice idea to rewild a golf course, but surely they needed the golfer’s cash…
No member of staff may speak to the press or other media! What are they going to do, dismiss you? Best just email anything rather than “speak”.
Birch Selsdon has had a mixed reception locally with some people loving it while others were shocked at its high membership fees and restrictions on non-members. Personally, I liked some of what they were doing but felt that they were only interested in the sort of people who could afford their fees – not the likes of me. However, whatever our views on Birch there is now widespread concern about what will happen next.
An immediate concern is what will happen to those people who were employed there and those running self-employed operations on the site? Birch may have been relying on inexperienced, and no doubt lower paid, staff but it was giving them chance to earn a living, and gain skills and experience for a career. Many small businesses are struggling as it is and so they are likely to be hard hit by the sudden loss in income from their projects at Birch plus any unrecoverable investment they might have made in the site.
In terms of the site itself, it is green belt land and so some local people spreading rumours of the site being given over to house building feels like unnecessary scare mongering. But given the history of Croydon Council allowing building on our green spaces, under Labour and Conservatives, those fears are understandable. The hotel buildings had been allowed to fall into disrepair over recent years and one of the positives of Birch was that they appeared to be restoring the building to use, if not back to former glories. Will any future buyer be willing to invest in maintaining this historic site?
Unfortunately the Joint Administrators, like Birch and the previous owners before them, haven’t felt that communicating with the local community was one of their top priorities, which will leave all of us who live locally with ongoing uncertainty. The state of the economy and the UK’s position internationally mean that it will be a struggle to find a buyer with a vision to turn this site into a thriving venue for local people and attract in customers from further afield.
As a near neighbour, member of the Selsdon Residents Association, and political candidate to represent the area at London level and in Parliament I am very keen to work towards a positive outcome. But I suspect we will all be left just crossing our fingers and hoping for the best.
I am not surprised that this has happened, every time I went to check this place out with my partner, we got turned away for not being a member and all that nonsense. So they were turning away paying customers that would have liked to have a meal & a few drinks there and I might of even stayed there if they didn’t restrict the Joe Public so much. Unfortunately The Birch were trying for a Soho House type business model which was never going to work and by doing this they just shot themselves in the foot, which is a real shame really as the building and grounds are magnificent and now it’s just another empty building!
You got turned away because you weren’t a member? Was that a surprise?
Being turned away by a business wanting people to come & spend their money with them would surprise most people. Unless you want the business to fail so maybe we can understand why they’ve failed!!
Customers wanting to spend money?
700 people have paid up to become members, so I guess they are now creditors and unlikely to get all their money back. A hotelier in my family stayed there in October and was surprised by the general tatty ambience, commenting “Expected luxury but instead feel like we have joined a cult”. I guess the landscape will continue rewilding all on its own.
Monthly subs, Di, so unless any have paid in advance, unlikely that they will be in the queue.
I smell a rat! Buy a going concern and then run it down and then overprice it so it is unaffordable.
Leave it to decay perhaps have a few fires to speed up the process? Typical developers game plan! Croydon Council please keep a close eye on this and never give planning consent.
Huge mistake closing the popular golf course
Hopefully new owner will reopen it
The hipster stupidity was never going to work in Selsdon
Perhaps they could remove the terrible razor wire around the entire periphery
Dont understand why these people purchased a amazong hotel /building to change hownl it was run
it was set to fail from the statt
there was nothing wrong woth the pld stule gramd country house and amazing golf course
apart from feeling sad for the building
i have no sympathy 😞
Sounds like the owners had Rolls Royce ideas on a push-bike budget.
Too many idiots in the catering business today.
What has been a shame especially with all of this, aside from personally losing what was a transformative space for me and my family for work and wellness, is the glee so many seem to have found in it failing. It was bringing money into the local economy and providing employment for many. but hey – I am just a hipster – what do I know?!
I agree with you, especially when they provide employment. I’m not glad it’s failed but I’m also not surprised. To run a successful business you need to know your market & if picking & choosing who you want to come you need deep pockets to survive. Well trained staff who wanted the business to survive would have welcomed anyone, but unfortunately my experience found rude & unhelpful staff. I asked about their adult play room (not something you see everywhere) and instead of chatting to me about the concept she told me to read the sign & then said; “what part don’t you get?” That was after being told later if I wanted a drink as they couldn’t do that then – with hardly anyone around! Not an experience that makes you want to revisit/ spend money there. Hence the outcome.