Swallow Hotels buys the Sussex "Harrods in the country"

The rapidly-expanding London Edinburgh Swallow Group has snapped up Cisswood House hotel in Sussex.

Known locally as the "Harrods in the country", the property in Lower Beeding near Horsham was built in 1928 for the then-chairman of the luxury London store, Sir Woodman Burbidge, and his wife Cissily.

The hotel boasts 52 bedrooms - some with four-poster beds and whirlpool baths - a 45-seat restaurant, a health club, and a beauty/hair salon.

Cisswood House also has four conference rooms, the largest able to accommodate up to 150 people, and holds a civil marriage licence.

London Edinburgh Swallow Group, which now owns more than 140 hotels, paid close to the asking price of £4.25m.

Property agent Savills sold the hotel on behalf of Pageant Hotels, a Cambridgeshire-based hotel company that manages the Gresham Court hotel in Bournemouth and the Longmynd hotel in Church Stretton, Shropshire.

Pageant recently sold Llyndir Hall hotel in Chester to the Feathers Hotels Group and bought the Royal Leamington hotel in Warwickshire which it will relaunch later this year as a boutique hotel.