An Unlikely Publican

Some careers only make sense when you look back.

Mine is one of them.

People are often surprised to learn that I spent almost a decade owning and operating a neighbourhood hotel.

And to be honest, it still surprises me sometimes.

At the time, owning a pub was not part of my plan.

Buying the pub wasn't even my idea.

I was raising a young family and deeply immersed in creating homes. I'd completed my interior design studies, finished renovating our family home, renovated and sold a holiday house, and was helping clients create homes of their own.

When my husband first suggested it, I wasn't convinced.

I certainly couldn't have imagined that years later it would become one of the defining chapters of my professional life—and a steep education in creating and operating commercial places.

Looking back, I think the story probably began much earlier.

When I was in my early twenties and studying psychology at university in Queensland, I worked at Brisbane's Pineapple Hotel.

The Pineapple—or ‘The Piney’, as everyone called it—was already a Brisbane institution.

I loved that it was family owned and respected the way the Singleton family looked after it. I enjoyed the flow of a busy hotel, the rush of dinner service, the return of familiar regulars and the constant hum of the place.

I was reminded recently by one of my dearest friends that I told her all those years ago,

"I think owning just one pub would be pretty cool."

It wasn't a business plan.

Just something I said as a twenty-one-year-old.

Thirty years later, that same friend called and asked what I was doing.

"I'm at the pub," I said.

We both laughed.

Perhaps twenty-one-year-old me got her wish after all.

Just not for the reasons she imagined.

Over time, I realised that what drew me to the East Village Hotel had very little to do with it being a pub.

I loved places with history, character and untapped potential.

The opportunity to understand what made them special, care for them well and leave them stronger than I found them.

When we acquired the East Village Hotel, I thought we were buying a business.

Over time, I came to understand that we'd also taken responsibility for a place that already meant something to other people.

Some places become woven into the life of a community.

The East Village Hotel was one of them.

It had stood in Balmain for generations, through changing neighbourhoods, changing owners and changing times.

During our stewardship, it would face something none of us anticipated.

A global pandemic.

Like hospitality businesses across Australia, we were navigating something none of us had experienced before.

Every day brought decisions, many made with incomplete information.

But the gravity of that period reinforced something I had already been learning.

You don't really own a place like the East Village Hotel.

You're simply responsible for it for a time.

That changes the questions you ask.

What does this place need?

What do the people who use it need?

Working alongside staff, suppliers and industry experts, we renovated, refined and repositioned the hotel over many years.

We invested in the interiors and gardens, developed the food and wine offering and welcomed locals, visitors and regulars through the doors.

Thousands of ordinary moments unfolded there.

Birthday dinners. Friday afternoon drinks. First dates. Trivia nights. Locals nights. Wine evenings. Corporate events. Final farewells. Quiet lunches. Family get-togethers. School functions.

Together they became the life of the place.

Running the hotel also taught me something I hadn't expected.

Resilience.

Businesses are tested constantly.

Rising costs. Economic downturns. Changing customer expectations.

Sometimes challenges arrive gradually. Sometimes they arrive all at once, as they did during the pandemic.

You adapt. You make difficult decisions. You learn. You keep going.

Owning a place with more than a century of history gave me perspective.

We weren't the first custodians to face uncertainty and we wouldn't be the last.

Somehow, the hotel endured.

I think some of that resilience rubs off on you.

Eventually, we sold the hotel.

The building changed hands. The lessons didn't.

Today, whether I'm working on a home, a hospitality venue or boutique accommodation, I don't see a finished project.

I see a place with a life ahead of it.

Something that will need to be cared for, adapted and improved over time.

Because the East Village taught me that creating a place is only the beginning.

Our responsibility isn't simply to own those places.

It's to leave them stronger than we found them.