Spencer Ray Lyon paid £37 for a hotel room in Bournemouth.
He got Bon Jovi posters on the walls, a figure of Legolas built into the plaster and exactly the level of luxury that £37 buys you on the south coast.
“I was put in a room with Bon Jovi,” the 33-year-old content creator told Creatorzine.
“Posters. He wasn’t actually there.”
The hotel markets itself around celebrity-themed rooms.
Each one is decorated with memorabilia and posters linked to a different famous figure.
It is not, to be clear, a hotel where celebrities stay. It is a hotel where pictures of celebrities watch you sleep.
He booked it because it was the cheapest option
Lyon, a live stream seller and content creator, wasn’t looking for a novelty experience. He was looking for a bed.
“I stayed there as it was the cheapest one I could find,” he said.
He decided to film it anyway. The resulting TikTok, posted on his account @lifeatgully, has been viewed more than 440,000 times.
Lyon said the room delivered exactly what the price suggested. “I paid low, expected low,” he said.
“The staff were friendly and helpful, and I used it for what I needed. A cheap overnight stay.”
The Legolas figure embedded in the wall was an unexpected touch.
Lyon described the overall experience as “unique,” which is doing a lot of work as a word in this context.
‘Take the celebrity part with a pinch of salt’
Lyon’s verdict was generous but honest. “Take the ‘celebrity’ part with a pinch of salt,” he said.
“I think it’s more for people who like looking at posters of famous people on their way to the room. But for the price I can’t complain. It served the purpose.”
There’s no pretence of glamour. The themed décor is the selling point and the joke simultaneously, and Lyon leaned into both in his video.
The comments wrote themselves
Viewers had questions. Practical ones, philosophical ones and one about planning regulations.
“£37 blooming heck that’s awesome, such a bargain, it has lovely furniture,” wrote one commenter named Lizzy, who was apparently won over.
“Did that used to be a hospital? It definitely looks like one from the front,” asked another, raising a question the hotel’s marketing team probably hoped nobody would ask.
The best comment came from a viewer named Nikki: “If a celebrity gets cancelled, do they have to change the decor of that room?”
A genuine logistical concern for any establishment that ties its interior design to public reputation.
Another summed it up neatly: “I mean it’s weird but for the price it looks pretty decent.”
Why it matters
Budget hotel reviews are a growing content niche precisely because the audience is enormous.
Most people aren’t booking luxury stays. They’re booking the cheapest thing on the app and hoping for the best.
Creators who film those experiences with honesty and humour tap into something the polished travel influencer space misses entirely.
Lyon’s video works because he didn’t pretend the hotel was something it wasn’t, and he didn’t mock it for being what it was.
He paid £37, got £37 worth of hotel and a Bon Jovi room he didn’t ask for.
That’s a better story than most five-star reviews.
The celebrity hotel in Bournemouth presumably has rooms themed around other famous faces. Whether any of them know about it is unclear.
Whether any of them have stayed there is almost certainly a no.
Lyon hasn’t said which celebrity he’d have preferred.
Given the Legolas cameo, the hotel might not be taking requests.
