Everyone who has been to Estelle Manor, the luxury hotel and members’ club in the heart of the Cotswolds, will surely agree that it is a triumph of sumptuous interiors, decadent design, extraordinarily high thread count and facilities so lavish that even the uber rich exclaim in joy.
Since it opened two years ago – a country cousin to the uber-exclusive Maison Estelle members’ club in Mayfair – it has won endless awards and welcomed everyone from movie stars, politicians, footballers, royals and is the first stop for every billionaire choppering into the Cotswolds.
Last summer it was the venue for a four-day, £5million wedding for Eve Jobs (daughter of the late Steve Jobs) and her show jumping partner, Harry Charles, with entertainment provided by Elton John on a custom built stage on a nearby football pitch. Or we think it was.
You never quite know for sure, thanks to Estelle’s obsession with discretion. Staff all have confidentiality clauses in their contracts and the club has a super strict ‘no photos or posting on social media’ policy to keep it all pleasingly hush-hush.
When I visited earlier this week, I could see why they are keen to protect it. It is the most beautiful hotel I have ever visited. And by far the most expensive – and we’ll come back to that.
But, lately, there have been gentle rumblings – beneath the bespoke chandeliers, tapestries and soaring ceilings, and in the soothing 40-degree warmth of the spa’s vast marble tepidarium.
All caused by the influx of – how to say this nicely? – a different sort of guest. Not billionaire jet-setters, or regulars like Kate Moss, Alan Carr, Amanda Holden, Robbie Williams, the Beckhams, actress Rebel Wilson, Princess Beatrice and Simon Cowell.
No, these are influencers, Instagrammers, social media content creators, who have become obsessed with everything Estelle.
Last week, Love Island’s Molly Mae was back for the third time in about a year with her on-and-off husband, Tommy Fury, posting again about her ‘cosy countryside’ stay.
Ampika Pickston, of Real Housewives Of Cheshire fame, treated us to a slew of pouty pics from her recent stay.
Holly Scarfone, from dating show Too Hot To Handle, posed in the library in a teeny weeny black dress. And Carly Acton (who ‘starred’ in Olivia Attwood’s show Bad Boyfriends) posted pictures of her sexy sportswear on the Padel courts.
But perhaps more alarming are the OnlyFans creators booking in to add a bit of ‘Cotswolds class’ to their feeds.
So look! There’s ‘Bethany’ trying out the hotel’s rifle range in the world’s shortest skirt and boots, with the tagline, ‘I only shoot my shot when it’s worth it’, to titillate her six million followers.
And Only Fans creator Ryelee Steiling in the exquisitely beautiful Estelle Suite (priced from £3,500), first pouting on the four poster bed, next in front of the soaring Jacobean windows and then on her own private balcony overlooking the pool.
And yes, of course, if you look beyond her tanned tattooed midriff and electric blue undies, the hotel looks fantastic in the background – roll top bath, pool shimmering, sunbeds laid out to perfection.
But some of the Club members (£3,750 a year, plus joining fee), promised ‘old school values of personalised service [itals] and discretion’, fear it is losing its sheen – that perhaps it doesn’t feel quite as exclusive any more.
Rich locals – of whom there are many in the Cotswolds – are also a bit miffed. They adore the place and love to come and stay, but are finding that many of the prime rooms and suites in the old manor house are booked out by Ryelee and co.
‘The last thing any of us want is another Soho Farmhouse!’ says one, who prefers not to be named, referring to the well-established members’ club a few miles away.
The staff are not keen, either.
‘We are getting more and more influencers and they can seem very entitled – though I’m not sure why,’ says one staff member. ‘They’re also a lot trickier to deal with than the members, who are mostly lovely, particularly Harry Potter star Tom Felton – he’s the best, talks to everyone! And knows how hard we all work.’
Another rolls her eyes at any mention of OnlyFans.
‘Of course we can’t stop anyone from coming here and we wouldn’t want to. But we do want them to behave better. And maybe put their phones down. It is changing the vibe.’
She has a point.
When I arrive at 2pm on a wet Wednesday, up the sweeping driveway, past the handsome staff in country tweeds, through the magnificent hallway perfumed by a specially mixed Estelle scent, and into an array of utterly exquisite reception rooms, I am met by a sea of screens. Every single person appeared glued to either a phone, laptop or iPad.
Of course, they could all be fretting about Rachel Reeves’ dog’s dinner of a budget. Wednesday is an unusual day, after all. But they didn’t look the type.
A good smattering are American. Some Asian. A couple of Australians. A few were comfortably-off couples and groups of friends happy to blow a lot of cash on a couple of days of total decadence.
But the rest are in their 20s and 30s, in very carefully curated outfits, looking a teeny bit out of place in the magnificent interior as they sneak pictures of themselves, each other and their meals.
As I tuck into my chopped salad (£22), a women on the sofa adjacent to mine wearing a Chanel jacket exclaims into her phone in wonder.
‘Oh my God! It’s amazing. It’s just like you see on TikTok!’
When Estelle Manor opened back in 2023 to massive fanfare, everyone was wildly exited. In its previous incarnations the building, formerly known as Eynsham Hall Hotel, had been a hunting pad, a retreat for pregnant evacuees, a police training centre and a rather tired hotel.
When it was bought for £10million by Sharan Pasricha (head of the Ennismore group) and his wife Bharti, daughter of Indian billionaire Sunil Mittal, in 2018 everyone gave a sigh of relief.
They’d already turned Gleneagles into the coolest hotel in Scotland, worked their magic on The Hoxton Hotel in London and the ridiculously exclusive Maison Estelle Mayfair club. They knew what they were doing and, crucially, were never going to run out of money.
And they had their muse, Estelle, a partly historic, partly fictitious woman who Bharti has described as: ‘A woman who never got married. She has many lovers. She is a woman of the world, nomadic. Everywhere she goes, she collects something: an antique piece, fabrics… everything goes into her trunk, and she comes home.’
So Estelle Manor is supposed to be her home – a place of extreme exclusivity and ‘indulgent permissiveness’.
And in bringing it to life, Bharti has included everything that any self-respecting billionaire could ever want.
From the world’s most lavish interiors to mini bars containing everything from sleep serums to eye masks, Ruinart Blanc de Blancs champagne to hair scrunchies. There are pink bicycles to ride around the 85-acre estate – I see two influencers taking videos of themselves on them. A state of the art gym. Teeny electric Land Rovers for children to drive. Even a selection of reading glasses behind every bar, in case the print on the cocktail list is too small.
They’ve never revealed the cost of the refurbishment, said to be ‘squillions’, but it was a huge boost to local employment.
Now the place is awash with hundreds of staff in smart uniforms – most of them (along with quite a few members) swiped from Soho Farmhouse.
Everywhere you look, they are polishing, serving, plumping, sweeping, straightening.
In the entrance to the 3,000-square-metre Roman-inspired Eynsham Baths – which only opened earlier this year but is already one of the most talked of spas in the world – one member of staff, dressed top to toe in white, appears to be in charge of removing very small pieces of gravel from the doormat. All afternoon.
Locals in the surrounding areas are also thrilled that a private members’ club on their doorstep pushes their already inflated house prices up even further.
And while the Cotswolds’ endless millionaires and billionaires already had Soho Farmhouse and Lady Bamford’s Le Club, with its artfully lit indoor pool and fitness classes to choose from, Estelle was a cut above. Or as some wags put it, ‘Soho House for grown-ups’.
For the real billionaires – who been flooding into the area from all over the world, but particularly America and Asia – it is exactly what they want.
In the heart of the Cotswolds, currently the trendiest location for the world’s wealthy, but uber high end, classy and utterly discreet. Or it was.
No wonder they love it. Because everything really is bigger and better here. The glittering bars, the food – four amazing restaurants, including the fantastic £150-a-head Chinese restaurant. The ice rink they open at Christmas. The pretty cottages you can rent on site and pretend you’re Cameron Diaz in The Holiday.
At the members’ end of summer party this year, they turned the outdoor swimming pool into a giant bath complete with bubbles, huge tap and enormous yellow rubber duck. The members drank so much that they ran out of spirits and ice, the neighbours went bananas about the noise and endless glasses were smashed (and stolen). Everyone in attendance said it was the best party, ever.
But no one shared photos. Because it was private. Permissive. And very much not for public consumption.
So it goes without saying that when, earlier this year, producers of a new ‘Real Housewives of the Cotswolds’ type TV show, starring Princess Beatrice’s best friend Gabriela Peacock, begged to used Estelle Manor as a filming location, they were laughed out of town.
‘They would never allow cameras inside,’ said a source. ‘It is arguably the most exclusive establishment in the UK, let alone the Cotswolds.’
Which of course hasn’t stopped the influencers and OnlyFans content creators. They can’t get enough of it. Though Lord knows how they afford it – the prices are astounding.
When I booked this week, the cheapest room available was £950.
It was very nice, in a modern wing a few minutes’ walk in the drizzle from the main house, and the bed was supremely comfortable, though sadly not a patch on Ryelee’s lovely 80-square-metre Estelle Suite.
But my bag didn’t turn up for over an hour and the fire doors banged a bit in the night and there was no bath – a room with a bath was another £600, which felt a bit steep.
But everything here is expensive. The £14 teacup full of chicken broth I ordered for lunch. The £22 – superb – spicy green chili margarita I sipped by the fire in the library. The £290 cost (for two) of the baths – worth it though because this is the only place that phones are actually banned, so it’s peaceful and quiet and not remotely busy, presumably because the daft influencers don’t see the point, if they can’t post it online.
And, particularly in Muse, the on-site boutique (‘where Estelle would shop’) where the most affordable – and pointless – thing I could find was a string water bottle carrier for £55.
But, of course, the cost is very much the point.
So when I ask the driver of my taxi – booked by the hotel – why the nine-minute drive from the local station costs £55, he says, ‘People who come here like to pay a lot. It doesn’t cost anywhere near that much. But they like it to feel so expensive. Whether they are rich, or not, it makes them feel good.’
Wow.
But the danger with that, of course, is that soon only multi-millionaires and successful OnlyFans creators like Ryelee will be able to afford it. Which perhaps is not quite the ‘indulgent permissiveness’ that Bharti first envisioned for the Estelle brand.
