In the great board game of life, how do you progress from the square marked
“south London osteopath” to the one that puts you in a Dordogne chateau
surrounded by a 130-acre estate? (And you’re not allowed to go down the
“pass Go and win the lottery” route.)
As the sun sets over the grounds of Le Mas de Montet, a Renaissance-style
chateau steeped in centuries of history, Richard Stimson, aperitif in hand,
begins to explain how he got here from the traffic-choked urban grit of
Streatham High Road. As he talks, the only sounds are the song of the
nightingales in the magnolia tree and the muted hoots of a barn owl that has
made its home in the top of the fairy-tale round tower.
From what Stimson says, the game plan can be summarised thus for readers in a
hurry: step one, make some money; step two, choose the right partner; step
three, use your skills; step four, learn new ones; step five, don’t curb
your enthusiasm - you’ll have to work hard.
The journey to Le Mas de Montet began in the 1990s, when Stimson, 47, and John
Ridley, 40, a management consultant, bought a derelict Georgian house in
south London.They restored it, with Stimson doing a lot of the work himself
– and gaining valuable experience – whennot attending to his osteopathy
patients. It sold for “nearly £1m”, and they paid £500,000 for Montet, near
Ribérac, in the Dronne Valley, in 2002. Selling the osteopathy practice and
another property raised the funds needed to do it up – almost £800,000.
Once the home of the Marquis de Nattes, a 19th-century commander of a local
infantry regiment (a fierce-looking cove with a bristly moustache,
commemorated on the square in Ribérac), it was a hotel in the 1970s and
1980s, welcoming the area’s most famous son, President François Mitterrand,
when he dropped in on his home turf. (His grandparents’ old farmhouse was a
mile away.) Yet Stimson’s “before” photos reveal depressing expanses of
damp-riddled wood panelling, manky bathrooms and rubbish-filled salons.
Leaving London and careers behind, the two men set to work. It took 2½ years
to transform the place into a grand but comfortable house, which has now
begun to pay its way as a chic, understated hotel. There’s nothing as
obvious as a bar, the bedrooms don’t have numbers, and no two are the same,
while the mandatory smoke alarms and safety lights are carefully concealed.
Stimson once again rolled up his sleeves and did most of the building and
decorating work (“except the plumbing and wiring”), while Ridley used his
con-sultancy skills and A-level French to put the whole venture on a
sensible business footing. He negotiated with suppliers (scoring a 50%
discount on the bathrooms) and workmen (not quite such a happy outcome there
– they ended up in court with one contractor).
He found the right professionals to help him with French employment law –
“It’s okay once you get your head around it” – and put a tax-efficient
business plan in place. “Last year, we made a small profit, despite our best
efforts,” he explains. “We always thought that’s how long it would take.
There’s a lot of investment to be depreciated over the next few years, so
the modest profit is deliberate. Then we came to decision time.”
More of that later. First, Stimson tells me how he decorated the 10 bedroom
suites and the elegant salons, including a charming, conservatory-like salon
d’hiver that dates from the 19th century. He restored all the windows and
doors, using “hundreds and hundreds of gallons” (possibly not an
exaggeration) of Farrow & Ball “bone” paint for the woodwork and for
salvaged vintage radiators. Most of the walls are an off-white shade he
mixed himself, and the ceilings are the same colour – which saved weeks of
“cutting in”, he says. He also points out how his bathroom tiling schemes
became progressively less fiddly and fancy with each subsequent backbreaking
job.
The fixtures and fittings in the 10 suites on the first and second floors,
though, are top-of-the-range. From the behemoth of a boiler in an
outbuilding to the £2,000 Czech and Speake towel rails and the £1,000 taps
in the bathroom of the Mitterrand suite, the money lavished on Montet is
more in the order of private indulgence than commercial budgeting.
Still, there were economies. Many of the antiques, including four-posters and
wardrobes, were bought in England at provincial auction houses. “French
stuff is cheaper there than here, especially elaborate gilt furniture,”
Stimson says. The luxurious-looking velvet tablecloths in rich, warm colours
were new, from a wholesaler in London. The trick is to mix old and new, so
people assume it’s all fabulous. The real secret, he confides, is “a company
and a Vat number. That lets you in anywhere, and you can buy at commercial
rates. When I buy in England for export, I don’t pay Vat”.
So, they had the place kitted out, including two cottages in the grounds,
created from the monkey houses where Madame Nattes kept her exotic pets. The
parquet floors were polished to a rich gleam and the new swimming pool
sparkled in the garden. They’d even hired a team of hotel staff (many of
whom are local Brits) – but now they had to learn to give their mainly
French clientele the kind of food they would expect.
“My uncle was a chef pâtissier at Mirabelle, on Curzon Street,” Stimson says.
“And he always told me, ‘Don’t be a chef.’ ” He would have been surprised,
then, to learn that his nephew recently became the first Briton to be
invited to join the Toques du Périgord, a band of chefs honoured for
maintaining the proud traditions of local gastronomy. The event made
national television.
In the expensively equipped kitchen, however, “We made it up as we went
along,” he confesses. “I did my best to pretend to be a proper chef. Now I
am one. It’s hard work, though, and stressful.” Ridley’s organisational
talents helped. “He can’t do sauces, but he streamlined the kitchen,”
Stimson says.
Then came “decision time”. Having made a success of Montet as a small hotel,
Ridley felt the next obvious step was to invest more money to “go down the
serious hotel route”. There were plans for 15 bedrooms and a spa in the 800
sq m outbuildings, and an 18-hole golf course has planning permission.
Instead, he has opted to pursue his dream of becoming a teacher – in, of all
places, unglamorous south London – while Stimson has his eye on various
projects in the Ribérac area.
They are leaving an established hotel that could be turned into an extremely
comfortable house – most of the contents are included in the €3.5m (£2.8m)
asking price – and there is what Ridley calls “a tax-efficient
infrastructure” if the next owners want to do a bit of B&B. The
selling agent, Knight Frank, is marketing Montet as a residential property.
“I could imagine this being a home – it doesn’t feel too big,” Ridley says.
“Whoever buys it will choose. We’ve done what reflects our interests.”
Before they go, they are planning a weekend house party for London’s gay
Alist. The place is also popular for weddings – on which subject, Stimson
has a word of advice for future owners. “Always interview the bride,” he
says. “If she starts producing swatches, and saying the flowers and the
napkins have to match, check the diary and discover that you’re fully booked
that weekend.”
www.lemasdemontet.com
Knight Frank ; 020 7629 8171
