Three new hotels for The Pig

The move will mean the group has a hotel in “every south coast county”, with the new properties coming in Kent, West Sussex and Cornwall.

The first of the new batch of hotels will be in the village of Bridge near Canterbury in Kent where work starts on The Pig at Bridge Place next week with the hotel due to open this autumn.

Formerly Bridge Place Country Club, the 28-room hotel will be set within a 16th century manor house, restored gate lodge, a new Coach House and seven ‘hop pickers’ huts, created from reclaimed materials found on an island within the grounds.

The Coach House will also feature a conservatory restaurant with open kitchen and views onto the kitchen gardens, while a barn is going to be converted into a casual Kitchen Larder.

Next up will be the Grade II-listed Madehurst Lodge, near Arundel in West Sussex, which was acquired last year and is slated to open as The South Downs Pig in 2019.

The last of the three new projects will be a conversion of Grade II-listed Harlyn House near Padstow in Cornwall, which will open as The Pig at Harlyn Bay in summer 2019.

"We’ve had a great couple of years, with customers apparently loving what we do," said Robin Hutson, chief executive of Home Grown Hotels. "Occupancy is in the mid 90%’s in our rural locations and we know from our guests they want more Pigs. After searching far and wide for truly unique properties, we really are over the moon about our new Piglets in Kent, Sussex and Cornwall, and can’t wait to get started on this new phase of our development."

The hotels will continue The Pig philosophy of putting the kitchen garden and restaurant at their heart, with anything that can’t be supplied by the gardens sourced from the best producers within a 25-mile radius in each case.

There are currently five hotels in The Pig portfolio - in the New Forest, near Bath, at Studland in Dorset, near Honiton in Devon and in Southampton.