If you have been paying attention, you will know that we are currently living through a golden age of short-term property rental. Where Airbnb once primarily existed as a method of gutting the soul from a local community, now it has gleefully entered the world of the one-night novelty stay.
In 2021, for example, Airbnb offered one lucky customer a night in an annexe of Coronation Street’s Rover’s Return pub. A year later, it listed an impressive replica of the house from Bluey. And, of course, most recently it listed Barbie’s DreamHouse as a rentable location. But these just gave you the impression of living the celebrity life. Airbnb has been very careful about not putting people in the proximity of actual celebrities.
Until now. Because for reasons that may never fully become clear, Gwyneth Paltrow has listed her own Montecito guesthouse on Airbnb. For one night only, for the right amount of money, you – yes, you! – could be staying mere feet from the woman whose head was chopped off at the end of Seven.
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In fact, it’s better than that. Because Gwyneth Paltrow won’t just be letting you stay in her guesthouse. She, along with her husband, Brad Falchuk, will also eat dinner with you, presumably before rushing back to her main house, bolting all the doors and windows and frantically scrubbing herself down with industrial quantities of hand sanitiser. To be fair to Paltrow, it is a very nice guesthouse. It has a big sofa, a wood burning stove, high ceilings, access to a swimming pool and, you would have to believe, swarms and swarms of privately hired security guards roaming the place in case you wrongly assume that staying in Gwyneth Paltrow’s guesthouse would make you anything more than an arm’s length promotional tool for Gwyneth Paltrow’s beauty range.
Because that would appear to be the reason for this gimmick. In the Instagram video announcing the stay, much is made of the litany of Goop products that will line the guesthouse’s bathroom. The video shows lots of tubes and tubs of Goop skincare, but who knows? Maybe Paltrow will push the boat out and leave you out one of those candles that smells like her genitals, or a jade egg that you can squirrel away inside your own.
But perhaps there’s something more to this. Unusually for an advert for a stay in a movie star’s home, Paltrow’s Instagram caption is hilariously bleak. “Loneliness is a human condition,” it begins, “but in the past few years, increased isolation and our lack of community has made our lives even more fragmented.” Which is less advertising copy and more a mid-90s Radiohead lyric. In fact, you probably shouldn’t be surprised if you win the stay and, over dinner, Gwyneth Paltrow rips off her face and reveals that she is actually Werner Herzog in a rubber Pepper Potts mask.
That said, it does cheer up a little towards the end. “While we may begin as strangers, I hope we’ll find connections and commonalities over a delicious meal,” Paltrow explains. Which sounds like this will be the perfect break for anyone who enjoys Goop, high ceilings, celebrities and brief, superficially cordial interactions with ruthlessly enforced boundaries.
Perhaps I’m being cynical, though. Perhaps Gwyneth Paltrow really is alert to the epidemic of modern loneliness, and perhaps she has deduced that the best way of solving it is to offer one presumably very wealthy person a chance to spend 19 hours in a small house located quite near her much bigger house. Who knows? It’s certainly worth a try.
Now, the rub. Booking doesn’t open for Gwyneth Paltrow’s guesthouse Airbnb for another couple of weeks, and the stay is strictly for the night of 9 September. As such, a price has yet to be revealed. Nor has anybody explained how the winner will be chosen. Will it be a prize draw? Will it go to auction, so the highest bidder wins? Will all the entries be vetted, to rule out the possibility of Paltrow being accosted by a crazed fanatic in her gorgeously appointed wine room?
Despite all these unknowns, however, this really does sound like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Perhaps you will win this stay, and perhaps it will change your life. Perhaps you’ll make a lifelong friend in Gwyneth Paltrow. Perhaps she will let you pitch her all your movie ideas and business ventures. Perhaps you’ll go away on holiday together. Or perhaps, at 11am the next morning, you’ll be wordlessly escorted to the exit by guards while Paltrow hyperventilates in her panic room. Honestly, who can say?
