What TV producer said to Josephine:

experience and ended up with her own TV series.

AT 7.29 tonight, Josephine Kime will be settling down in front of the TV with her family and friends. By 7.30pm she will be the star of the show.

Hot Hotels is a new six-part lifestyle series taking viewers behind the scenes at some of the region's hospitality hotspots. And Josephine is its fledgling presenter.

She wrote to Tyne Tees asking for work experience last summer and her CV landed on the desk of producer Wendy Homewood in her York office.

"Her CV was very impressive," said Wendy, "but the thought of having to do my job with someone on work experience trailing round after me didn't exactly fill me with joy.

"Then she walked in, this beautiful six-foot blonde, and I thought 'hate her'."

Within minutes, however, she realised that Josephine was not only smart and beautiful, she was also charming with a lot of potential.

Wendy had been developing her Hot Hotels idea for a while and now she thought she may have found the perfect presenter - a 21-year-old Harrogate model in her final year at Durham University with no TV experience whatsoever.

In the end, Josephine was not a hard sell. As soon as the bosses at Tyne Tees saw her screen test, they gave Wendy the go ahead to offer her the job.

Filming for the series began in January, when Josephine was already working hard on her philosophy and sociology dissertation.

But somehow she still managed to fit in shooting a six-part series taking in top hotels and B&Bs from Berwick-on-Tweed in the north to York in the south.

"I'm a very organised person," she said. "So I made sure I was well on my way with my dissertation and I took plenty of reading with me on shoots.

"The great thing about this job was that I got to stay in a lot of wonderful hotel rooms that were quiet and comfortable - ideal places for writing essays."

Josephine, a Harrogate Ladies' College old girl, has been modelling since she was 13 and has had lots of amateur stage experience.

"I had to stop her projecting," said Wendy, with a laugh. "For the first few takes I could see she was acting. She was playing the part of a presenter."

When she realised she was supposed to be chatting with viewers in their own living rooms and not projecting to an audience of thousands at the Royal Albert Hall, Josephine relaxed and got into her stride.

"It was wonderful to watch her progress as the series went on," said Wendy. "She's not vain and overly self-critical, so she's able to be herself on screen, even when things don't go according to plan."

Such as when her cooking skills are shown to be lacking; she is plonked on a horse for the first time; and a blizzard cuts short a golf game.

Most of the time, everything did go to plan. And the plan was to visit some of the most luxurious and - more importantly - interesting hotels in the region, such as Shallowdale House in Ampleforth; Hotel du Vin, Harrogate; The Grange, York; Rudding Park, Harrogate; and The Star Inn, Harome.

"We meet the people who own, run and work in the hotels," said Wendy, "but there's also a strong emphasis on lifestyle - interior design and leisure activities are very important elements of the show.

"There can't be many of us who aren't curious about what it's like in the most expensive suite in the house, whether we can afford to stay in it or not.

"Well, Hot Hotels will tell you - and we'll reveal which celebrities have stayed where."

Whether Josephine becomes a celebrity herself remains to be seen, but she's young, she's ambitious and she's already got a series under her belt at 21, so who's going to bet against her?

"I've explained to her that this is a very ephemeral business," said Wendy. "One day you're flavour of the month, the next you are Anthea Turner."

But Josephine is determined to give it a whirl.

"I'm going to take my show reel to some London agents and see what happens," she said.

"I would love to do a travel show, something like Wish You Were Here, or a project you get to work on from beginning to end like The X Factor.

"But if that doesn't work out, I've still got my modelling and my degree to fall back on."

Yes, she's beautiful, she's talented, she's got a TV series in the can and she's just been awarded a 2:1.

There's perfect, and then there's Josephine Kime.

Hot Hotels, 7.30pm every Tuesday on Tyne Tees for six weeks from Tuesday, June 28

Updated: 11:26 Tuesday, June 28, 2005