Pelham House began its story back in the 16th Century when a man named George Goring bought a plot of land with a vision to build a lavish stone mansion decorated to the highest standard of the time. This included magnificent wooden caryatids and panelling. The panelling remains to this day and can be seen in one of the hotel’s restaurant rooms.
The property remained in the Goring family for nearly 100 years before they sold it to Peter Courthorpe. Peter only owned and lived in the house, and its land, for a comparatively short while before dividing the estate it into separate lots and selling them off individually.
One of these lots, the main house, was bought by the Pelham family, who gave the building their family name and “Pelham House” was born. The family began the process of buying back the land and other property thus restoring the estate. In 1725 Thomas Pelham set about a major refurbishment of the house to “bring it up to date” for the period.
The Pelham family sold the property in 1806 having lived here for 150 years. Over the next 197 years Pelham House was owned by a variety of people, including the East Sussex County Council, who used it as the administrative headquarters for more than 75 years.
In 2004, Pelham House was purchased jointly by a group of four local families and was converted into the beautiful hotel as you see today. A sympathetic conversion was undertaken to create the 31 romantic Boutique hotel style bedrooms, each of which was individually designed for maximum comfort but ensuring that many original historic features of the building were preserved.
All the bedrooms are fitted with contemporary handmade oak furniture, remote controlled TVs, phones and high speed data points and have en-suite baths or luxury showers. Most of them overlook the pretty south facing garden, with views beyond to the South Downs, which have just been declared a National Park and area of outstanding natural beauty.
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