Warner’s Sinah Warren Hotel

In the 1920s Andrew Carmichael Arbuthnot had a dream. It was rather an expensive dream but it didn’t matter as he could afford it. His family owned the private merchant bank of Arbuthnot Latham and Co. He dreamed of a mansion. A mansion built of the finest oak with twisted pillars and door brasses shaped as hearts, diamonds, spades and clubs. So he set about building his mansion, exactly as he had imagined it. The result was Sinah Warren on the Isle of Wight.

An expert on timber, he not only had the choicest varieties incorporated into the mansion but a tree of every variety in Europe was planted in the grounds. Locals and guests were regularly invited to look around. He and his wife – Jessie Lambert of the Lambert & Butler cigarette dynasty – threw some lavish parties.

At the outbreak of war he established a factory farm to help deal with possible food shortages. The estate was requisitioned by the Navy for wartime use and halfway through the war, for reasons unknown, he lost interest in the house, laid off all the staff, sold off the farm equipment and basically walked away. He owned a 2-bedroom flat nearby and preferred staying there. Locals described him as eccentric, impulsive and intensely interesting.

After the Navy moved out the house sat empty and abandoned for 13 years. The beautiful grounds, once tended by 12 gardeners, became overgrown and neglected. Arbuthnot died in 1953.

In 1957 the 52-acre estate was bought by Portsmouth builder Albert Figgins who restored the house and converted it into a hotel. Brick chalet blocks were built in the grounds and he opened it as a holiday camp in May 1958 with an initial capacity for 200 guests. It was sold to Warner’s Holiday Camps less than a year after opening and one of the Warner brothers (John) held his wedding reception there in October 1959. Mr Figgins went on to develop two more successful camps on the Isle of Wight at Fort Warden and Nodes Point.

Plans to expand the resort were stalled after fierce local opposition. One said that the typical holiday camper “noisily parades the streets in a degree of undress and behaves as if he has bought the island for a week”. Another described holiday camps as “a necessary evil” and someone else mentioned that a golf course existed nearby and that “holiday campers and golfers cannot exist side by side”.

During the 1960s a Tiki bar was added along with a popular Old English Grill – the chef was quoted as saying “my aim is to serve food in such a way that a customer will say afterwards “that was a jolly good meal I had”. It became the most expensive resort in the Warners empire “Take luxury for granted in the former home of a millionaire” and it was never referred to as a holiday camp but as a “chalet hotel”.

In 1981 a nightclub opened named ‘Arbuthnot’s’ after the previous owner. In 1983 a £500,000 leisure complex was built consisting of an indoor pool, gymnasium, sauna and badminton courts. In the late-1990s the long awaited expansion finally took place and most of the old chalets were demolished and replaced by two new hotel buildings offering 250 rooms in total. A handful of the old chalets still exist. The site is still open today.

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