Many people ask me why Spain? Why hotels?
I think my decision was made during my childhood in Kent. Whilst growing up , being one of five Miller daughters we all struggled for our fathers attention, the infamous "Martin Miller" - Antiques Guru, Creator of Martin Millers Gin, entrepreneur and womanizer! It wasn't easy following in his footsteps and from a very young age he wanted us to appreciate how he had made his life from scratch and to enjoy it.
My first job at the age of 14 was a summer job working for my dad in our hotel called Chilston Park in Maidstone. I personally thought I had done a fairly good job in the marketing department but when he realized that I was to blame for organizing the staff party that overflowed with drunken staff members into the lake in front of the hotel I was banned from future posts.
From that small snippet of insight into the hotel world I then ventured further abroad. The following summer I faxed numerous establishments in France desperate to find a voluntary position and leave the nest, at east temporarily. I spent the entire summer working all departments in the South of France, eating croissants dipped in hot chocolate and being teased for my terrible grasp of the lingo by lovely French men. This proceeded to a four year University degree in London with a year working away in France where I was lucky enough to be given the post of translator to the general manager of a hotel in receivership, so thrown head first into understanding how not to run a hotel!
All vital information for my career path, however by this time I had found hotels to be quite tame (for want of a better word) and immediately after graduating jumped on a plane to continue my travels and in so doing ended up 3 years down the road owning a restaurant, a lounge bar, a juice bar and a delicatessen in Cusco , Peru. There I remained for 7 years before finally dragging myself back to civilization and returning to Granada in Spain. Once again I opened 2 establishments before It finally dawned on me how hard restaurant work actually is. Its exhausting and even more exhausting watching every one else having a good time whilst your still cleaning up! After 5 years I'd had enough, sold up and head to the Caribbean with my Venezuelan partner with the idea of sailing the islands and settling down. Well this was the beginning of settling down but not as I had imagined . Just after passing the Panama Canal I found out I was pregnant (with Benji)and cut the journey short to return to Spain. I was unable to find work in my condition so eventually with my dads help found a hotel needing a revamp in Somerset, Uk where we moved to for the first 8 years of Benjis and his little brother Ollie's life.
Being general manager to 14 staff was the hardest part of the job, especially in a remote area where staff are hard to find. Even though I had helped my father set up 3 other hotels within the family chain and do the interior decorating, I still found managing staff the hardest part. I worked so hard during those 7 years that my relationship suffered severely. My dream was to move back to Spain and create a boutique hotel that I could manage single handily if needed, where I could spend more time with my children and less time working. I gave my whole heart to my hotel in Somerset but once my dad passed away with cancer I couldn't bare to stay. I decided to make my dream come true and make the move back alone with my 2 young children to Spain.
