by Both can be true. This is a mantra we are practicing as a family right now. For example: yes, your brother has spent the last 10 minutes tapping the top of your head with a pencil, which is completely angry and frankly sociopathic behavior. But also: you spent the previous 10 minutes kicking him in the shin so his response is miraculous in its moderation. Both of these things can be true, so you might as well take a breath and move on with your life.
A little-recognized truth, in our polarized era, seems to be useful in many contexts. For example: the Hilton Garden Inn Silverstone. It is essentially a hotel without character. And yet it has more wow factor than 99 per cent of UK hotels.
The first and only beachfront hotel at the legendary motor racing circuit opened last summer. Paris Hilton was attending the party, in a blue and white rhinestone dress. I can’t help but wonder what must have gone through her mind, as she drove up towards the place. Because Silverstone is located within an industrial park outside of town – the kind of place where you spend your bank holiday Monday, wandering around Carpet Warehouse and trying to suppress memories of your former ambitions. The front of the hotel isn’t much more exciting either.
It looks like an airport terminal. Half the ground floor is taken up by a “superstore” selling McLaren and Mercedes merchandise (hoodies, gilets, not a rhinestone in sight). Inside, there’s a tall bronze and glass atrium with an F1 racing car parked directly in front of the check-in desk (which might be sexier if it weren’t surrounded by retraction belt barriers, as if it were stuck in long pass control queues. ).
Upstairs, in the open-plan bar and dining room, a large flat screen shows sports and sets the tone. “It’s like they did a special collaboration with Farrow & Ball,” says the husband as we sit down. “Grey Fume Exhaust.” Everything – floors, walls, bar, tables, chairs – is a subtle shade of charcoal. Even the flavors in the crowd-pleasing burgers, pizzas and curries are on-brand and muted.
Upstairs, our two interconnecting rooms follow the same formula – competently designed, comfortable, a significant commitment to the business travel color palette. A collection of small framed photographs of cars and bottles of frothing champagne are the only reference to the site. And then we open the curtains.
“Your balcony will see the track,” I was told. And I had just bought an idiot, imagining something like the “sea views” of Fawlty Towers. But holy pin. Open the balcony doors (ultra-glazed) and you’re practically there on the track. Any closer and you would be inside Lewis Hamilton’s helmet.
The neighboring balconies are occupied by young lads with camera phones who are clearly living out their best boy racing dreams. The color flashes! The lights! The ear splitting engines! It vibrates through your skeleton, your blood fizzes. Every time the cars round the bend towards us, I get a surge of wild, flowing excitement. And no one is more surprised than me.
During race events, the 75 track-front rooms and suites can be transformed into hospitality suites, which account for the corporate decor and mean that regular punters are unlikely to get one during major events such as the Grand Prix. while qualifying in my Fiat 500.
But there are other races. We visit a Legends of Motor Racing event, where historic Jags, Triumphs, and even Minis race around the track in glorious, vivid vintage colors (not a hint of gray here). A glass corridor crosses the track from the hotel to the complex and the Paddock pit, where we walk between the cars yet to race, watching their loving crews tweak, polish and prepare them.
With so much character and color on display here, it’s perhaps wise that the hotel doesn’t try to compete. And after making our way through the crowds, it’s clear that our private balcony is by far the best and most comfortable place to take in the whole circus.
The next morning, after a buffet breakfast that filled the tank but failed to set the heart racing, we headed to the Silverstone Museum, just around the corner and where hotel guests get a 50 percent discount on their entry tickets . The venue charts the history of Silverstone from the Second World War airbase to the track of today. Sound less than scintillating? Well, I thought so too, but dear reader – it’s one of the best family-friendly museums we’ve visited. Every single exhibit is interactive, from a Scalextric reproduction of the track that could be played, to driver simulations, screens that allow you to design and race your own car or try live commentary.
Trust me when I say you don’t need to know or, frankly, care about motor racing to enter. You are immersed in history, engineering, design and more. That’s how this new hotel is corporate at heart, but it’s also a great place for a mini family break. Both are true.
How to do it
A family of four can stay in two interconnecting trackside rooms at the Hilton Garden Inn Silverstone (01327 493160; hilton.com) for £300 a night, B&B.
