My Unique B&B often features some stunning and truly one-of-a kind locations, exciting passionate show host Simon Parfett at the possibility of a new design or renovation project. However, when visiting a stunning lighthouse in Monmouthshire on the Severn Estuary, Simon appeared shocked - and a tad disappointed - to learn he wouldn't be getting his design claws into the lighthouse.
Owned by Danielle and Frank, who featured on today's episode (March 31), the Grade II listed building housed 18 bedrooms. But rather than tackle the lighthouse itself, the program instead focused on doing-up the pair's old sensory deprivation tank and turning that into a cute B&B.
"Tell me we're going to do the lighthouse at the top," Simon asked upon arrival.
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Frank laughed: "No, no, no, no. That Simon, I'm afraid, that is the project." Frank pointed to a "shed" next to the lighthouse. Frank continued: "It used to be our floatation tank."
He explained the "shed" had been their sensory deprivation tank, designed to remove all sense of feeling in the body. Also known as a flotation tank or an isolation tank is a dark, soundproof tank, filled with around a foot of salt water, heated to skin temperature and almost completely saturated with Epsom salts to allow users to float.
Users enter the tank naked and are cut off from all external stimuli - no sound, no light, no sensation. Floating weightless in the tank will supposedly allow user's brains to enter a deeply relaxed state.
"It was the in thing when we moved here from London," Danielle explained. "There wasn't much demand here, but Frank stayed in there for 24 hours."
A disbelieving Simon asked: "You did a 24-hour stint?" "I've still got the world record," Frank replied.
Frank appeared to be an avid user of the tank, having claimed the world record for the longest time spent inside a deprivation tank - a whopping 24 hours. Since then, however, the old tank, which had been part of a therapy centre the couple used to run, had fallen into a state of disrepair. It became too expensive for the couple to constantly heat the water from the tank, so the pair closed it down.
In the decade that followed, the ceiling and floor began to loosen up and fall apart and the tank needed some serious work to turn it into a liveable, rentable B&B.
"The roof is absolutely shot," Simon told the couple. "Completely saturated and rolled. Yeah, this building is a complete rebuild, isn't it? The whole thing is subsided."
Simon got to work redesigning a new building for the pair, while Frank tore his world record-holding sensory deprivation tank to the ground. The new building, which appeared similar to the old in both size and shape, differed only in that it wasn't unsafe to live in.
The new water-front shack was redesigned to match the lighthouse behind it, and had been covered in a golden wood cladding. inside had been carefully decorated with collected branches which had been turned into a mirror, and the blue and white colouring highlighted the nautical theme.
"It's like everything's perfectly balanced, isn't it?" Frank said to Danielle, after seeing the completed project. "They've done an amazing job."
"It's like a piece of art," she said, overwhelmed. She continued: "We are so grateful to you cause when you came, it was a derelict building, wasn't it? Oh I can't believe it!"
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