Saturday, December 31, 2022

Flicking a cottage

Professor Gert-Rudolph Flick puts his South Kensington cottage on the market for £105 million

 

The media have shown much interest in Beauchamp Estates bringing a hidden South Kensington cottage to the market this week for £105 million. What they missed is that this property, Park House off Pelham Street and Onslow Square, has quite a history and has variously been the home of Lanning Roper, Sir Maxwell Joseph, Lady Annabel Goldsmith and most recently Professor Gert-Rudolph “Muck” Flick.

 

The exterior of Park House, Pelham Street, London, SW7 2NG
The exterior of Park House, Pelham Street, London, SW7 2NG
Park House is hidden between Onslow Square and Pelham Street
Park House is hidden between Onslow Square and Pelham Street
The property stands on a plot of over half an acre
The property stands on a plot of over half an acre
One would never imagine finding such an oasis in the heart of South Kensington
One would never imagine finding such an oasis in the heart of South Kensington

Constructed in 1841, the house was originally two separate properties, Park House and Park Cottage. Park House was occupied by its builder, a grocer turned developer called James Bonnin, whilst Park Cottage took its name from a tailor named Thomas Park. A studio was built nearby in 1888 and in 1987 remodeling by the Italian architect and designer Toni Facella Sensi resulted in the creation of the property on sale today.

 

Lady Annabel Goldsmith spent many happy years at Park Cottage
Lady Annabel Goldsmith spent many happy years at Park Cottage

In 1959, Mark Birley and his then wife Annabel (later Lady Goldsmith) moved into Park Cottage. She recounts her time there in a book No Invitation Required: The Pelham Cottage Years:

 

“The day I discovered Pelham Cottage was a day that both changed and enhanced my life… I could not believe such an oasis could exist only a few yards from South Kensington Tube station. In my daze of delight, I knew immediately that I had stumbled upon something magical here”.

 

It was during this time that Pelham Cottage played host to the cream of London’s society. Claus von Bülow played backgammon there and Nicky Haslam wandered “round the drawing room shifting furniture”. Edith Marchioness of Londonderry advised on the garden and Patrick Plunket “loved it with a passion”.

 

Professor Gert-Rudolf Flick has lived at Park House since 1986, first with his second wife Donatella Flick and more recently with his third wife Dr Corrine Flick
Professor Gert-Rudolf Flick has lived at Park House since 1986, first with his second wife Donatella Flick and more recently with his third wife Dr Corrine Flick

The hotelier and property developer Sir Maxwell Joseph (1910 – 1982) lived in the property for a period subsequently and in 1986 the Daimler Benz heir Gert-Rudolf Flick and his then wife Donatella £4.5 million for Park House.

 

The grandest entertaining space created for Professor Flick is undoubtedly the 48-foot drawing room
The grandest entertaining space created for Professor Flick is undoubtedly the 48-foot drawing room
The dining room
The dining room
Entertaining spaces have been designed so as to bring the garden into the house effortlessly
Entertaining spaces have been designed so as to bring the garden into the house effortlessly
One of six bedrooms
One of six bedrooms

A 1991 Architectural Digest feature on the house reported that the couple “wanted a house, not a cottage” and so commissioned Facella Sensi to “give it an arrangement”. He created what is currently a 6 bedroom, 7 reception room “little palazzo” to display their “remarkable collections of English silver, antique furniture and Italian landscape paintings”, the “little palazzo” and of it Flick himself commented:

 

“I was attracted to it because it is almost a country house in the middle of London. It is very quiet. From no window can you see a car passing by”.

 

Lanning Roper
Lanning Roper

The secret gardens of Park House were landscaped in the 1950s when the American garden designer Lanning Roper lived there. Roper, most famous for having been commissioned by Prince Charles to do the grounds of Highgrove in 1981, is said to have “set a style for country flowers in town” and Cecil Beaton photographed “the wildflowers, the thick greenery and the little rarities that reveled in the warmth of sheltered walls” of Park House.

 

With an incoming owner, a new era is set for this hidden gem after Flick, despite fierce opposition from neighbours including cellist Julian Lloyd Webber, secured planning permission for a vast subterranean extension earlier this year. Should construction go ahead, it would include rooms for winter and summer wear, a luggage store, a 50-foot swimming pool, cinema room, gym, beauty treatment room, steam room and passenger lift. Building would take around three years and payments of £157,500 to the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea’s affordable housing fund and £66,000 to the cover the Mayor of London’s Community Infrastructure Levy would be required.

 

When planning was granted, Mr Lloyd Webber expressed his distaste to The Daily Telegraph stating:

 

“I think it is a very bad decision by the council, which they will come to regret. The fact is when you put it all together, we just know the disruption is going to be massive. It is poor planning decision. The council should protect its residents but if it can grant permission for this, one of the oldest houses in the borough, it seems nothing is sacred. When people realise what they are going to face, there will be a lot more protests”.

 

Just like Mark Birley’s former home, Thurloe Lodge, Park House is unlisted. If the new owner proceeds with the proposed development, Park House will not only be one of London’s most expensive homes, it’ll be another of London’s most pricey residential building sites.

 

 

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    5 COMMENTS

    1. Interesting that Annabel Goldsmith lived there….her grandfather [edited correction], of course, was a well known Nazi sympathiser and the Flick family did well to keep their ill gotten gains….
      While originally a member of the liberal German People’s Party, Flick’s family also supported the Nazi Party financially from 1933, and over the next ten years donated over seven million marks to the party[citation needed].
      During the Second World War the Flick family’s industrial enterprises used 48,000 forced labourers from Germany’s concentration camps. It is estimated that 80 per cent of these workers died as a result of the way they were treated during the war. Friedrich Flick was found guilty of war crimes at Nuremberg in 1947 and was sentenced to seven years in prison, but was pardoned shortly after and resumed control over his industrial conglomerate, becoming the richest person in West Germany.

    2. I worked as this mans Butler for a time in Park House.He was always good to all who worked for him and treated us all as equals.I dont think he lives in the past.I think he looks to the future.Maybe we all should.After all,this House was not a shadow of what it is now when Mr Flick bought it.His vision will help keep our property market bouyant.Hope he gets every penny.good luck Sir. John D.

    3. The fact remains that his family have a dark heritage. Interesting how the Flick family fortune was unaffected by war, yet Jewish families had their fortunes devastated. Sorry, I don’t buy into all this ‘he treated his staff well”.
      It is the least he could do considering how his grandfather treated his slave prisoners. The Flick’s fortune is filthy.

    4. I hear nobody wants to buy this ugly house ,which is in the middle of so many flats that circle the perimeter, it is more like a land for an MOT garage, it has been reduced from 105M to 50M with no takers. Will be interesting to see which mug will finally buy such a dump without a view………… but there is always someone!

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