AN INSPECTOR CALLS

He pays his way... and tells it like it is

WE KEEP hearing that Hastings, on the south coast, is on a roll. It’s even been described as the ‘new Brighton’. A friend, who moved there not so long ago, loves the place but has often said that what it lacks is a good hotel.

Then I received an email from her saying that Vive had opened near the station in a grotty part of town but that it looks ‘stylish’ from the outside.

And it does in comparison to the other drab, run-down buildings on Havelock Road. But, inside, it’s grim.

The idea is to create a ‘convergence between hotel and apartment’, according to the blurb, ‘with a twist of industrial art deco — inspired by the brutalist 1960s architectural exterior’.

It’s a collaboration between Jason Bull, former owner of Ibizian hotel Es Vive, and its designer Sean Cochrane.

When Es Vive was sold to Lionel Messi, the pair opted to take on this former university building in Hastings. Each of the 49 studio rooms is equipped with a basic kitchenette.

Very basic. There’s a jar of instant coffee and some tea bags — and two depressing sachets of longlife milk in the fridge. No water.

A plastic cheese plant sits on the window sill, along with other fake ferns. The whole confection is grey and tinny, with a tiny shower room. It’s only been open a few months and already the loo seat in my room needs urgent attention. For some reason, the TV is mounted on a wall at a right angle to the bed, making it impossible for two people to watch.

And for a hotel billing itself as offering a ‘well-deserved dose of modernity,’ getting online is absurdly laborious.

It requires a ten-digit, upper and lower case (plus numbers) password, which takes you to an entirely different site requiring a different username and another password.

The bar, restaurant and spa aren’t yet up and running. They’re meant to come on stream in October and eventually there will be 98 rooms.

So I head for the seafront and find an Italian restaurant called Bella Napoli, where O Sole Mio comes through the sound system just as I am presented with a spectacularly awful ‘traditional prawn cocktail’.

Walking back into Vive is a soulless experience. Yes, Hastings might be in need of a good hotel — but this isn’t it.

Vive Hotel Havelock Road Hastings TN34 1BE Tel: 07593 647313, vivehotel.co.uk Doubles from £220.00