Signature Living couple handed bankruptcy orders
Bankruptcy orders have been handed to Liverpool property developer, Lawrence Kenwright, and his wife Katie.
The couple are behind the Signature Living hotels brand which emerged in 2008 and which is now a shadow of its former structure following several receiverships and administrations.
The couple are subject to a 12-month bankrutpcy order which was made at Liverpool County Court on January 30. The orders will be automatically discharged on January 30, 2025.
The orders involve the subject’s assets being shared among those they owe money to.
Kenwright’s empire started in the form of serviced apartments on Liverpool’s Victoria Street, which quickly grew to a sprawling hotels empire in Liverpool and stretching as far as Manchester, Belfast and Cardiff, all aimed at the stags and hens leisure sector.
In 2018 Kenwright announced plans to transform Liverpool’s Cavern Walks retail centre into a luxury hotel. Yesterday it was revealed that the Motto by Hilton brand will open a 283-room hotel there.
The first signs of trouble within the group emerged in May 2019, when the group put its two biggest assets, its landmark 30 James Street and Shankly hotels in Liverpool, up for sale.
At the time, the Signature portfolio comprised the Dixie Dean Hotel (Liverpool), Alma De Cuba (Liverpool), Cavern Walks Hotel (Liverpool), Kingsway House (Liverpool), RainHill Hall (St Helens), George Best Hotel (Belfast), Waring Hotel (Belfast), Liverpool Road (Manchester), Victoria Mill (Manchester), Shankly Hotel (Preston) and the final phase of the Coal Exchange development (Cardiff).
The Signature Living Group also announced plans to launch its first cruise ship enterprise in Spain.
Later that year a string of disgruntled international investors in the hotels brand launched action demanding their money back. They had bought into Signature’s ‘fractional sales’ model, but said payouts promised to them had been delayed. Kenwright said he was doing his best to repay them.
On November 18, he said: “I’m doing my best, they’re going to have to trust me.”
He said delays to Brexit were having a “devastating” impact on the hotel and property development sectors.
That was to worsen when the pandemic hit in 2020. On April 18, 2020, The Shankly Hotel in Liverpool fell into administration.
A month later, Signature Living Coal Exchange Limited, the company behind the hotel at the Coal Exchange building in Cardiff, was put into the hands of administrators.
The parent company of Signature Living’s labyrinthine network of 60 bar, hotel and development businesses collapsed into administration, owing creditors £113m.
In January last year HMRC applied to the High Court to force Signature Living Apartments Limited into administration.
An attempt was made to dissolve the business and strike it off in September 2022, but an objection to this was filed in the High Court in October 2022.
Mr Kenwright has previously been declared bankrupt, in 2010.
