Gilpin Hotel & Lake House

About Gilpin Hotel & Lake House

Gilpin has been run by the same family since 1988 and remains one of the best-known addresses in Cumbria. The property is really two hotels on two estates just over a mile apart: the main house on Crook Road, set in around twenty acres of gardens and moorland, and Gilpin Lake House, a much smaller adults-only retreat on its own private lake with a handful of suites and a swimming pool. Guests staying at either can use both.

Rooms range from classic bedrooms in the original house to garden suites with private terraces and hot tubs, and standalone spa lodges, each with a cedarwood hot tub, sauna and a small treatment area of its own. Interiors are comfortable rather than austerely modern, with heavy fabrics, log fires in the public rooms and a lot of natural light. There is no large communal spa in the main hotel, which is deliberate; the treatment rooms are small and quiet.

Food matters here. HRiSHi serves a modern menu with a clear Indian influence and has held recognition from the Michelin guide for years, while Gilpin Spice next door is a more casual pan-Asian dining room built around a shared-plates format. Breakfast is cooked to order, and afternoon tea is served in the lounges. The wine list is long and the service is notably unstuffy for a hotel at this level.

The location is a genuine advantage. Windermere and Bowness are ten minutes away by car, but the hotel itself sits in quiet farmland with walking straight from the door towards the Winster valley. It suits couples on a special occasion, anyone wanting a food-led break, and walkers who would rather return to a proper dinner than a pub. Children are welcome in the main hotel; the Lake House is adults only.