Robbie Williams has taken a maximalist approach to midlife — try everything once is the gist. He put out the brilliantly bananas biopic Better Man, in which he is represented by a CGI chimpanzee (a commercial flop, though many critics loved it). He held an art exhibition in London (“tone deaf and self-important”, said one reviewer of its many self-help quotes). And he released the album Britpop, a swaggering tribute to the musical movement that contained his best songs in two decades.

And so the creative streak — by turns Angels-levels good and Rudebox-levels bad — continues. His latest wheeze? In an interview with the BBC this month the singer said that he wanted to set up a hotel chain. Where? Anywhere. What would they be like? Well, they would certainly have their own music venues, in which he would perform.

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It is a tantalising prospect for haters and lovers of Williams (I’m firmly in the latter camp). Just imagine the decor. A line-up of waxwork Robbies — bleached, toothless 1995 Glasto Robbie; the skeleton Robbie from the Rock DJ video; diminutive chimp Robbie — greet you in the lobby. Corridors are configured like the tunnels that spit him out onto a stadium stage. In the spa, named Rehab and decorated with the artworks he didn’t flog at that exhibition, jazz versions of She’s the One and Strong soundtrack your massage (for an undisclosed sum, Williams will perch on the end of the bed in his undies, as he did throughout a recent four-hour Netflix docuseries). And wow, the Knebworth Suite! Available only for three-night packages, in honour of that glorious weekend, this is where true fans will want to stay: the bathroom has a bidet imprinted with the visage of Noel Gallagher.

Robbie Williams wearing a gray fur coat and making peace signs with both hands at the "Better Man" special screening.Robbie Williams wants to set up a hotel chainGetty Images

Before he rolls ahead with the plans, however, Williams would do well to speak to the Libertines. I loved the Albion Rooms, the hotel that the band opened in Margate, Kent, in September 2020. The room in which I stayed that month was fantastically moody — all black paint and brass furnishings — and had a heart painted on the walls by Peter Doherty, who had previously squatted downstairs with his huskies. The restaurant was surprisingly upscale (the elderberry and saké trifle sticks in the mind), while the bar already felt like a genuine community hub. But the venture didn’t work out and the hotel closed in June 2024.

The Libertines co-frontman Carl Barât said that the band wanted to spend less time running a hospitality business and focus on music again, yet I suspect the problems ran deeper. Trust is important when it comes to hotels and you can understand why even Libertines fans might have stayed away, given the band’s rambunctious image. They would have been wrong to do so, of course — the hotel was perfectly well run and the wildest thing I saw there was a Huel vending machine outside the recording studio at the back of the building. Rock. And. Roll.

Loyalty is key too. To succeed in hospitality you need return visitors. In their respective heydays, fans of the Libertines may well have come back again and again in the hope of running into their heroes. Twenty-plus years past their peak? Unlikely. And then there’s the cost. A ticket to see Williams at the Emirates Stadium in London last summer set me back £105. If you’re charging more than that for a Williams-themed experience such as a night in a hotel then you’d better guarantee that he’s going to be playing live downstairs. Otherwise, why wouldn’t I stay down the road instead?

A sitting room at The Albion Rooms with patterned furniture, a black coffee table, and a large mirror.The Albion Rooms hotel, set up by The Libertines in Margate

It is telling that hotels successfully run by musicians are business ventures entirely distinct from their previous careers — you wouldn’t know that the stylish Rival Hotel in Stockholm belonged to Benny Andersson of Abba, for instance, or that Gloria Estefan owned the glamorous Cardozo South Beach in Miami.

Contrast this with the Albion Rooms, where each room was styled by a different band member and the decor riffed on the Libertines’ discography. Williams would surely follow this route, so his hotels would be a fun novelty — and age fast.

My favourite Williams song is Feel. The lyrics sum up his chaotic career, hurtling from Hollywood to hotels: “Cause I got too much life running through my veins/ Going to waste.” You know what, Robbie? Sometimes that’s OK.

Would you stay at a Robbie Williams-owned hotel? Let us know in the comments