1 · Opening
Claridge’s did not need a founder.
It already had nearly two centuries of history, royal mythology, Art Deco identity and an extraordinary service culture.
What it needed was someone willing to believe that reverence was not enough.
McKillen’s authorship begins with a paradox: change almost everything guests cannot see so that the institution they love can continue to feel timeless.
2 · Why he matters
Heritage hospitality often confuses preservation with inactivity.
McKillen’s Maybourne chapter argues the opposite.
A historic hotel survives because kitchens are rebuilt, services modernised, rooms rethought, restaurants recruited, art introduced and obsolete space converted into valuable space.
Continuity is constructed.
3 · Property as potential
McKillen built an international property career around assets with unrealised potential in important locations.
He looks at a building and asks what hidden value can be released without destroying what made the asset irreplaceable.
In hospitality, that becomes restoration through development.
4 · 2004 — Buy four London institutions
In 2004 an Irish investor consortium led by Derek Quinlan acquired the Savoy Hotel Group for £750 million. McKillen was one of the principal investors.
The portfolio included The Savoy, Claridge’s, The Connaught and The Berkeley.
The transaction bought famous names — but also buildings whose physical condition and infrastructure required enormous work.
5 · Sell The Savoy
The Savoy was sold soon afterward and the remaining three hotels became Maybourne Hotel Group.
McKillen later explained that The Savoy did not sit easily with the other three.
Portfolio building is not only acquisition. It is also editing.
6 · Start with The Connaught
McKillen began the transformation programme with The Connaught.
The hotel closed in 2007 for a major restoration reported at about £70 million.
Historic rooms and public spaces were restored while new design, restaurants, bars, spa infrastructure and a contemporary wing expanded what the institution could do.
Do not modernise by flattening character.
7 · Twenty artists and designers
Contemporary accounts describe McKillen hiring roughly twenty artists and designers for The Connaught project, approving furnishings and artworks and remaining personally involved in detail.
His method is closer to producer or curator than passive investor.
Bring strong authors together, then make the building hold the conversation.
8 · Hélène Darroze
McKillen persuaded Hélène Darroze to establish her London restaurant at The Connaught.
The decision made gastronomy part of the hotel’s renewed identity rather than simply a supporting department.
A great hotel becomes a platform for other creators.
9 · Find value above the ceiling
At The Connaught, McKillen identified disused space beneath the roof, including old water-tank areas, and pushed for its conversion into one of the hotel’s most valuable suites.
Luxury value may already exist inside the building.
It is simply trapped in obsolete use.
10 · Claridge’s — The harder problem
Claridge’s presented a more difficult challenge because its mythology was even stronger.
The lobby, façade, Art Deco interiors and accumulated rituals were part of London’s cultural memory.
The redevelopment had to be radical and almost invisible at the same time.
11 · Do not close Claridge’s
The most extraordinary decision was to undertake a vast engineering programme while keeping Claridge’s operating.
Teams excavated five floors into London clay beneath the existing hotel. At the same time, the property expanded upward.
The hotel effectively grew in two directions while continuing to receive guests.
12 · Dig five floors down
The five-floor basement redevelopment created infrastructure the historic building could never have accommodated within its old footprint.
It eventually housed Claridge’s first spa and swimming pool, new kitchens, wine storage, technical functions and cultural space.
Invisible infrastructure made visible luxury possible.
13 · The spa beneath the legend
Claridge’s Spa opened in 2022 after teams excavated deep beneath the hotel.
For the first time in its history, Claridge’s had a swimming pool and dedicated spa environment.
Interior architect André Fu created an East-inspired sanctuary several floors below the famous lobby.
A heritage hotel acquired a major contemporary luxury expectation without sacrificing its historic public rooms.
14 · ArtSpace
Claridge’s ArtSpace opened as a purpose-built gallery designed by John Pawson, a long-time McKillen collaborator.
The space was carved from the underground volume and created to museum-quality standards.
McKillen described it as part of a commitment to the arts and to keeping Claridge’s relevant for the next generation.
Art was not hung on hotel walls as decoration. The hotel built an institution for it.
15 · Build up as well as down
Claridge’s redevelopment also added three floors containing 72 new rooms and suites, topped by a vast rooftop penthouse with its own swimming pool and ornamental lake.
The protected identity remains at street and lobby level while an entirely new luxury machine grows above and below it.
Timelessness is supported by major intervention.
16 · Restore the Ballroom
The redevelopment did not only create new space.
Claridge’s Ballroom was restored to reveal and revive its Art Deco details.
Expansion earns legitimacy by being paired with restoration.
17 · Three hotels, three personalities
Claridge’s, The Connaught and The Berkeley were strongest precisely because they were not converted into a visually standardised chain.
Claridge’s: Art Deco legend and social theatre.
The Connaught: intimate Mayfair house, art, bars and gastronomy.
The Berkeley: fashion-facing, contemporary and experimental.
The group identity sat above difference rather than erasing it.
18 · Art as operating material
McKillen’s hospitality work repeatedly uses art as more than decoration.
At Maybourne, artists and designers enter renovations, public spaces and galleries. At Château La Coste, art and architecture become the estate’s organising system. At The Shinmonzen, contemporary art and Tadao Ando architecture enter a nine-suite Kyoto hotel.
Art is one of the raw materials of his hospitality worldview.
19 · Château La Coste
McKillen’s Provence project reveals his authorship more directly than Maybourne because he is not working inside an inherited London hotel mythology.
Château La Coste is a roughly 200-hectare wine estate combining vineyard, art, architecture, restaurants and hospitality.
Architects and artists including Tadao Ando, Jean Nouvel, Frank Gehry, Renzo Piano and others have contributed works and buildings across the landscape.
The destination functions as a continuously expanding conversation between land and creators.
20 · Villa La Coste
Villa La Coste added overnight hospitality to the estate.
The hotel has 31 suites and sits within the vineyard, art and architecture environment rather than beside it as a separate resort compound.
Hospitality becomes a way to inhabit landscape, architecture, wine and art for longer.
21 · The Shinmonzen
The Shinmonzen in Kyoto is another small-scale expression of the same instincts.
The nine-suite hotel in Gion was developed over more than a decade and designed by Tadao Ando with artist collaborators.
It takes inspiration from the ryokan while addressing a modern international traveller.
McKillen’s role is to assemble creators around a place with a very strong existing culture.
22 · The producer model
McKillen is best understood less as a single-style designer than as a producer of hospitality environments.
He identifies a property, chooses architects, designers, artists, chefs and engineers, pushes the physical project intensely and protects the overall composition.
His signature is not one colour or material.
It is the density and quality of collaborators.
23 · 2015 — Ownership changes
In 2015 McKillen sold his Maybourne shares to Qatari interests under an agreement connected to the future value and redevelopment of the hotels.
He nevertheless remained deeply involved in renovation and development for years afterward.
Creative and development authorship can continue after equity ownership changes.
24 · The relationship breaks
By 2022 the relationship between McKillen and Maybourne’s Qatari owners had broken down and he was removed from his role.
Subsequent disputes over valuation, fees, contractual rights and the economic consequences of redevelopment became the subject of litigation and arbitration.
The allegations are contested.
The transformation chapter did not end as harmoniously as the hotels themselves appear.
25 · Do not confuse current Maybourne with the McKillen era
Maybourne today owns and operates an expanded portfolio including Claridge’s, The Connaught, The Berkeley, The Emory, The Maybourne Beverly Hills and The Maybourne Riviera, and is pursuing further global growth.
Some expansion overlaps with projects developed during or emerging from the McKillen chapter; some belongs to the current ownership and management era.
McKillen’s LHL significance should be attached to the restoration-development authorship he demonstrably led, not to every later Maybourne decision.
26 · What he changed
He treated historic luxury hotels as living assets capable of radical physical reinvention rather than untouchable monuments.
He drove major restoration and redevelopment across The Connaught, Claridge’s and The Berkeley while protecting their distinct identities.
He used artists, architects, designers and chefs as co-authors of hotel identity rather than suppliers of decoration.
He turned obsolete roof, basement and back-of-house space into valuable guest and cultural spaces.
He demonstrated that major engineering intervention can support — rather than necessarily destroy — perceived timelessness.
He extended the producer-curator model into Château La Coste, Villa La Coste and The Shinmonzen.
Paddy McKillen did not create Claridge’s.
He treated an existing legend as something that could still be physically reinvented.
27 · What this model does not solve
Extreme redevelopment of heritage hotels is capital intensive and can make commercial performance dependent on very high room rates and asset valuations.
Founder-like creative control by an investor can produce coherence but can also create governance conflict when ownership changes.
Art patronage can deepen a hotel’s cultural identity while also turning cultural capital into luxury real-estate value.
Historic authenticity is selective: every restoration decides which period to preserve, which layer to remove and which new intervention to legitimise.
Engineering complexity creates construction, safety, cost and operational risks — especially when a hotel remains open during works.
The producer model depends heavily on personal relationships with exceptional creators and may be difficult to institutionalise after the producer leaves.
Later legal disputes show that creative contribution, equity ownership, contractual rights and economic reward can diverge sharply.
The McKillen model does not solve the tension between preservation and transformation.
It makes transformation the means of preservation.
28 · Paddy McKillen and Dietmar Mueller-Elmau
Both acquire or inherit hospitality institutions whose histories are much older than their own involvement and refuse to treat heritage as a command to freeze the property.
Mueller-Elmau rewrites philosophy and rebuilds the hotel around a new idea of freedom.
McKillen rewrites physical capacity while trying to preserve emotional continuity.
Mueller-Elmau argues with the past. McKillen excavates beneath it.
29 · Paddy McKillen and Massimo Ferragamo
Both combine property ownership, restoration, art, landscape and hospitality.
Ferragamo restores a Tuscan estate as a social and agricultural ecosystem. McKillen turns hotels and estates into platforms for architects, artists, chefs and new forms of guest space.
Ferragamo lets Tuscany dominate the authorship. McKillen curates a conversation among creators.
30 · Paddy McKillen and Vladislav Doronin
Both are property developers who enter ultra-luxury hospitality through valuable existing institutions.
Doronin acquires the Aman brand and builds a larger global platform around its scarcity. McKillen works more directly on the physical fabric of individual landmark hotels.
Doronin scales the institution. McKillen intensifies the building.
31 · LHL connections
- Claridge’s · London — defining restoration-development project; five-floor basement, spa, ArtSpace, rooftop expansion and extensive restoration.
- The Connaught · London — first major Maybourne redevelopment chapter; restoration, new wing, gastronomy, bars, art and suites.
- The Berkeley · London — third historic London institution within McKillen’s Maybourne chapter.
- Maybourne Hotel Group — McKillen was a major shareholder and redevelopment force, but is not the current owner.
- Château La Coste · Provence — vineyard, art and architecture estate associated with McKillen’s long-term creative development.
- Villa La Coste · Provence — 31-suite hotel within Château La Coste.
- The Shinmonzen · Kyoto — nine-suite boutique hotel designed by Tadao Ando with artist collaborators.
- John Pawson · André Fu · Guy Oliver · India Mahdavi · David Collins and other designers — collaborators across the hospitality projects.
- Hélène Darroze — defining culinary collaborator at The Connaught.
32 · Timeline
- 2004McKillen joins the investor consortium acquiring the Savoy Hotel Group for £750 million.
- 2005The Savoy is sold; Claridge’s, The Connaught and The Berkeley form Maybourne Hotel Group.
- 2007The Connaught closes for a major restoration and reopens after an intensive redevelopment programme.
- Late 2000s–2010scontinued investment across the Maybourne hotels; restaurants, bars, suites, art and architectural projects expand.
- 2011Château La Coste’s art and architecture estate opens more broadly to the public after years of commissions and development.
- 2015McKillen sells his Maybourne equity to Qatari interests while remaining involved in redevelopment under contractual arrangements.
- 2016Villa La Coste opens, adding luxury hospitality to the Provence art-and-wine estate.
- 2010s–2022Claridge’s undergoes a vast programme of excavation, restoration and vertical expansion while continuing to operate.
- 2021Claridge’s restored Ballroom and five-floor basement redevelopment enter the modern institutional history.
- 2022Claridge’s Spa opens; McKillen’s working relationship with Maybourne’s owners ends amid disputes.
- 2022The Shinmonzen opens its contemporary Kyoto hospitality chapter after more than a decade of development.
- 2020sMcKillen continues independent property, art, architecture and hospitality projects outside Maybourne.
33 · LHL story — Dig Five Floors Down Without Closing Claridge’s
Claridge’s is open.
Guests cross the black-and-white lobby floor. Afternoon tea continues. The doormen remain at Brook Street.
Below them, another building is being created.
Teams dig five floors into London clay beneath a hotel that cannot stop being Claridge’s.
New kitchens. Wine storage. Engineering. Gallery. Spa. Swimming pool.
The guest should experience the result.
The guest should barely experience the construction.
34 · A second story — The Water Tanks Become the Best Suite
A great old hotel has a roof.
Under it sits obsolete space and disused water tanks.
Most operators see back-of-house history.
McKillen sees a room guests will cross the world to occupy.
The water tanks disappear. A new top-end suite appears.
This is the developer’s eye applied to hospitality: find luxury hidden inside obsolete function.
35 · Legacy
Paddy McKillen belongs in the Luxury Hospitality Library because he demonstrates that stewardship of a great hotel can require acts that look almost hostile to preservation.
Excavate beneath it. Build above it. Replace its kitchens. Add a wing. Bring in artists. Build a gallery. Recruit chefs. Create a spa where none existed. Turn water tanks into a suite.
Yet the guest must still believe the institution is itself.
That is the paradox of his best work.
At The Connaught and Claridge’s, McKillen treated history not as a finished composition but as a structure strong enough to accept another layer.
At Château La Coste and The Shinmonzen, the same instinct becomes more personal: assemble extraordinary creators, respect the place, and let hospitality give people time inside the work.
Paddy McKillen did not create Claridge’s.
He treated an existing legend as something that could still be physically reinvented.
Sources
What the entry rests on. Each reference records the specific facts it supports, so a disputed line can be traced to the account it came from.