The Astor Hotel

What happened after

Converted into 13 luxury apartments plus one six-bedroom townhouse.

Closure date on record: 2018

What happened on the show

Alex Polizzi opened series 6 at the Astor Hotel in Plymouth and promptly found herself in conflict with its headstrong owner. That clash defines the case. The property, near Plymouth Hoe, had been run by Joseph Louei since 1999, and the episode turned on the friction between Polizzi's outside diagnosis and an owner disinclined to accept it. A rescue depends on the proprietor's willingness to change, and the Astor tested that from the first instalment of the series. Polizzi's work here was as much about winning an argument as redesigning a hotel, trying to move an entrenched owner off habits that were holding a struggling Plymouth guest house back. The clash with its headstrong owner opened series 6 in July 2010, and by 2018 the property had left the accommodation trade for good.

After the cameras left

The Astor Hotel is gone as a hotel. By 2018 the Plymouth property had been converted into thirteen luxury apartments plus a six-bedroom townhouse, a change confirmed by Plymouth Herald reporting. Its longtime owner had run it for around fourteen years before the conversion. The building near the Hoe survives, but not as accommodation for travellers; it is residential now. Given the ownership friction Polizzi ran into, the outcome fits a pattern the show saw often, where an owner reluctant to change eventually exits the trade altogether.