‘I abandoned high-octane city life to start a guest house in Devon’

During my twenties and early thirties I had a classic “work hard, play hard” life. I had a flat in Shepherds Bush, west London, and I loved the city life of going to the theatre and out for fancy dinners. I was lucky enough to travel all over the world with my job in public relations.
But during the first lockdown I went to stay with my parents in Devon and I had a complete change of heart. I loved London and then, suddenly, I was done with it.
My grandparents had bought a tiny bungalow, Seaflowers, in the village of Frogmore in 1990, when I was four. I spent every summer there and it was my happy place.
When my granny got sick in 2011 my parents moved down to Devon. They extended the house to convert it into a bed and breakfast, but it was designed with the idea of keeping my grandparents in their bedroom, so it was a bit higgledy-piggledy.
Since I was working I was only really able to get down there at Christmas and Easter. But then I spent the first lockdown in 2020 in Devon and I fell back in love with it. I loved being near the sea.
I went back to London but it just wasn’t the same. Then, the following year, my parents started talking about retiring — running a bed and breakfast is hard work and they just wanted to slow down. My reaction was: “You can’t sell the place. It is part of our family and too beautiful to lose. There must be a way to keep it.”
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Working out a way for me to take over was hard work because I have two sisters and it had to be fair. We spoke to an accountant and eventually worked it out. I sold my flat and paid my parents a lump sum. I am paying off the remainder every month, which is funding their retirement, and in five years I will have paid them the full market value.
I moved down to Devon full time in October 2021. My parents stayed on running the business for a couple of years, and I kept my job, working remotely.
Then in 2023 my parents found a house in the village to buy and I took over. I decided to do a renovation because, although my parents had maintained it well, it looked quite dated, and was a different style to what I wanted. I wanted it to be somewhere I would want to stay.
The renovation was definitely stressful. There was a point when I had 98p in my bank account, and I was using guest deposits to buy paint. But, by March 2023, I was ready to open Seaflowers.
Because I am still working full-time I’ve set it up to be as easy as possible. We have self check-in, I have a cleaning team, and I outsource the linen. But I wash all the towels, do the gardening, and I am the repair person. I also do all the bookings and marketing and the website myself.
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Luckily my job is a global role, and I am able to fit running Seaflowers in around it. It’s all a bit of a juggle — there are times when I am going from a video call to refilling the hot tub.
I live in an annexe on the side of the house — it is a very small one-bedroom flat. I Airbnb it, so I am often living and working in my VW Caddy. I have a favourite spot, a beach which is ten minutes from the house, where I can stay. It has really good wi-fi and public toilets, and I can go to my parents’ house for a shower.
Since moving to Devon my life has completely changed. I hike, I am in the sea every day, I have learnt to fish, and I have chickens which I have become very fond of. I have a much richer life and a broader community of friends than I had in London, and I feel so much calmer and happier. If I start getting stressed I can just go and throw myself in the sea.