Positive Press

In the eyes of the national media, Hastings & St Leonards was always the gawky, ugly cousin to cool and trendy Brighton.  Now that the regeneration work's starting to pay off, Hastings is going up in the attractiveness stakes: so much so that it's been getting admiring glances from the fickle national press.

The Daily Telegraph has recently enjoyed a very public flirtation with the town.  Reporter Nicholas Roe says the town is "perking up" with glitzy additions such as the new railway station; yet it manages to keep its "intimacy, sense of character and self-confident, rock-solid identity that oozes from Hastings' older streets".

He must have been smitten: in another article, he comments that a "makeover of theatrical proportions is turning a faded old beachside glamour girl into a born again sexpot".  High praise indeed.

Writing in the Sunday Mirror, property journalists and TV presenters Justin Ryan and Colin McAllister clearly had their heads turned: "Hastings has shaken off the sad and seedy image that haunted it 10 years ago … It is no longer the poor neighbour to fellow Sussex resort Brighton".  In fact, they declare, Hastings has "risen phoenix-like from the ashes" due to "hard work by the locals, plus massive private and public sector investment".

Mail on Sunday reporter Andrew Moody, meanwhile, picked up on Hastings' potential for business relocation, featuring local business Meta One, given the growing trend for entrepreneurs to work from an office by the sea.

Hastings is finally attracting the positive national attention it has long been denied.  The question now is, could it be a supermodel of the future?

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