The Perfect House in the Perfect Location
The Sandcastle in Wales is the result of a dream that began in childhood, grew up in London and was fulfilled by creating one of the best luxury large holiday cottages in Pembrokeshire, South Wales.
What began as a search for a new home, has become a haven for people looking to escape from the pressures of daily life. Somewhere to escape to a world of peace and quiet. A large beach front holiday home, that descends straight to the beautiful sands of Freshwater East Bay.
Whether you are looking for a large luxury family holiday accommodation or Summer holiday beach front house, the Sandcastle is what you are looking for.
Many of our visitors are looking for large family breaks in Pembrokeshire Wales, or big holiday houses, where they can spread out in style.
Our indoor and outdoor swimming pool is available all year round, as are the hot tub and steam room.
If the weather isn’t great or you just fancy relaxing at the house, our holiday rental has a home cinema room, snooker table and tennis table as well.
It all began when The Princess Alexandra, “the Alex”, as it was affectionately known, was laid to rest in January 1985 and the Portobello Gold was created. In the beginning, wishing to distance himself from the Hell’s Angel reputation of the Alex, Michael re-established the traditional Sunday roasts … then introduced London to the oyster-shooter and to draught-wheat beer. The Gold partied through 32 Notting Hill Carnivals. In spring 1995, their cleaner Keith, an ex-US Navy programmer who never quite went home after his tour-of-duty here (until finally being deported in 1996), helped him to become one of the first Cybercafés in the world. In 1996, the upstairs bedrooms were also wired up, making them the first UK hotel with Internet access in the rooms – remember, this is back when people had to travel with modems.
Where it Started
We had just finished complete renovation and extension of Mount Severn – our “forever house” overlooking Freshwater Bay and visible from The Sandcastle balcony – when we got a call at 9am on a Saturday from Gary, the builder of our beautiful floral wall. He told me that the estate agent for Trewent Bungalow (a strange name for a two-floor house) was putting up a for sale sign. I drove straight down to look around outside and called the agent from my car 15 minutes later and said, “We’ll have it”!
Having been renovating properties all my life, my gut told me that with a once in a lifetime location such as this, you have to just go for it and worry about the consequences later.
Building the Sandcastle
The house itself was, apart from the balcony, very solidly built but appallingly laid out. The bedrooms were incredibly dingy with tiny ceiling height windows and, hidden behind a hedge, was the invisible sea.
To make matters worse there was a corridor running between the four downstairs bedrooms facing the (invisible) sea and four fairly sumptuous bathrooms – with no windows at the back. Hardly en-suite! There was a cracked swimming pool that had been tiled by some passing travellers (seriously) and a pointless slipway, where our new pool is now, right alongside the existing public slipway! Clearly a complete rebuild was necessary.
As it was built with planning permission for just one floor, the National Parks stated that, provided we produced tasteful plans, they would draw a line under the stack of past planning enforcement summonses.
Whilst a two-story house by the sea was unheard of, they preferred that to having a derelict property right on the beach. Due to our cunning landscaping, people still think it is a bungalow, even from the sea.
The only way we were going to sort out this massive mess was to bring over our building team from Slovakia. Sad to think that this is the only way to get anything done in the UK: not so much about cost, but speed.
With anywhere from 6 to 12 men working 10-12 hours a day, 6 days a week and lodging locally at the old house up the hill, we achieved the whole operation in 12 months.
As soon as the main living room and balcony were presentable, we brought down all the furniture from the other house and did a staged photoshoot. This was in April 2018 and from the end of July we were soon solidly booked. “No pressure then!”
