The Cotswolds, Norfolk’s posh northern third and the Lake District have enjoyed a veritable monopoly on the trendy weekender market in recent decades, calling fashionable millennials to the country on a Friday evening with the lure of foodie pubs, glamping hideaways and elegant manor house hotels.
However, the announcement that international hospitality brand Nobu has chosen 185 acres of the rural East Midlands for its ‘first-of-its-kind’ UK resort looks certain to pin a new destination on the cool crowd map.
Last week, the Japanese-inspired company, which has more than 50 restaurants and 38 hotels globally, revealed it has struck a deal to transform Woolfox, an upmarket and well established popular country club in Rutland, England’s smallest county.
The arrival of such a global brand – co-owned by Robert De Niro – has likely sent shockwaves rippling across Rutland Water, the tranquil scenic reservoir hewn out in the 1970s, which has long been the region’s best loved attraction.
The Woolfox country club in Rutland will soon feel the Nobu effect, after the global brand announced it had partnered with the low-key resort to create a brand new hotel, private members’ club and restaurant on the site
Soho Farmhouse in the Cotswolds, which opened in 2015, has proved there’s an appetite for cool English rural retreats, with stars including Dua Lipa (far right) and Bella Hadid (far left) checking in
It’s a down-to-earth spot, affectionately known to locals as ‘Ruddle’s Puddle’ (named after Sir Kenneth Ruddle, the late owner of a nearby brewery) and in the summer months, the waters are a busy haven for picnicking day-trippers, the kind who might prefer sandwiches and a flask of tea over sushi and flutes of Moët.
Nobu’s decision to go for a slice of the country chic tourism pie – demolishing the existing golf club and driving range in the process – is almost certainly inspired by the successful blueprint created by Soho Farmhouse in the Cotswolds.
The hip members-only hotel and spa has become a countryside go-to for the rich and famous since it first opened in 2015. Meghan Markle held her hen party at the Oxfordshire retreat ahead of her marriage to Prince Harry in 2018 – and everyone from Taylor Swift to Bella Hadid and Dua Lipa have since descended.
Nobu has already divulged, via a series of artist’s impressions, that the Woolfox makeover will also include a private members club, as well as a hotel with 25 hotel lodges and 57 holiday lodges plus wellness facilities that include a spa, swimming pool and state-of-the-art gym. And, of course, a signature Nobu restaurant.
Rutland Water, a huge resevoir, has been the East Midlands’ region’s most popular attraction since it was created in the Seventies
Built it and they will come? What Nobu in the smallest England county of Rutland might look like according to artist’s impressions
Soho Farmhouse has created the blueprint for upscale country retreat success – but the Cotswolds is a saturated marke
Celebrity sightings – the Beckhams, the Ramsays, the cast of Rivals! – in Rutland’s country pubs simply don’t happen, and the triangle of cities framing the county – Peterborough, Leicester and Nottingham – are outshone by cultural big hitters such as London, Manchester and York.
However, the region’s tourism fortunes could now all change in the swish of a sashimi knife – and there’s plenty for discerning travellers to enjoy, with the East Midlands slowly carving out its own middle class visitor path.
Why has Nobu – which is also building a 76-storey property in Manchester – pointed its commercial compass at a region many of its target audience have never holidayed in? Easy, it’s an unsaturated market – unlike the Cotswolds – with bags of potential.
The brand was founded in New York in the 90s by Japanese chef Nobu Matsuhisa, with the backing of De Niro, amongst other high profile names.
16th century English country pile Burghley House lies just 20 minutes from Woolfox and makes for an impressive afternoon out
Its restaurants quickly became a byword for celebrity; Tom Cruise, The Kardashians and Taylor Swift are all regulars at the Malibu outpost.
Kate Winslet once uttered that Nobu’s food was ‘Heaven on earth and sex on a plate’. Along those lines, ex tennis idol Boris Becker famously conceived his third child after an illicit encounter in a cupboard at London’s Nobu in 1999.
What started with sushi restaurants has now evolved into a global hospitality empire. In this quiet corner of the East Midlands, the brand says it will ‘reimagine the Nobu lifestyle as a nature-led retreat, blending luxury hospitality, world-class dining, and refined living with a slower, more restorative pace.’
Stamford, with its creamy stone and high-end independent shops, can rival any Cotswolds high street for charm – and is just ten miles from Woolfox
The patchwork fields and rolling hills of this scenic portion of England’s ‘middle’ are as easy-on-the-eye as the country’s more popular rural tourism hotspots.
And, while Rutland’s quaint villages may not yet have the middle class gloss of Chipping Norton or Burnham Market, there’s plenty of footfall from the aforementioned cities to ensure Nobu will work.
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The nearest town is Stamford, a ten-minute drive away and just over the border in Lincolnshire. This affluent market town, with the River Welland running through it, already has a faithful following thanks to its 16th and 17th Clipsham stone architecture, independent shops and characterful pubs.
Luxury hotel and restaurant The George, right in the heart of town, is booked up weeks in advance and Stamford has provided an authentic backdrop to plenty of period dramas, including the 2005 film Pride & Prejudice, in which it almost outshone Keira Knightley.
If the Cotswolds has Highgrove, then regal Burghley House fills a similar role here. A short drive from where Nobu will land, this enormous 16th century ‘prodigy’ was built to honour Queen Elizabeth and has gardens designed by Capability Brown.
What do locals make of Nobu moving in? Reactions have been mixed, with plenty of residents in the villages surrounding Woolfox feeling like the swish resort will benefit local communities.
Others have been less enamoured with the news, with one frustrated objector suggesting to The Telegraph that the development is nothing more than a ‘huge housing development.’
