Viewer of Petra Ecclestone’s £32,000,000 Eaton Square home leaves with £500,000 of jewellery
In 2008, the Financial Times’ Richard Holledge described Finchatton’s renovation of 63 Eaton Square in Belgravia as a “daring conversion”. Last month, the very same property was the location of something equally daring: a £500,000 jewellery heist.
The billionaire Formula One magnate Bernie Ecclestone purchased the 8,088 square foot Grade II listed house for his daughter Petra – whose name means “stone or rock” – in 2009. It had been marketed at £25,000,000 and with Country Life’s Holly Kirkwood describing it as being “a wonderful modernised six-storey townhouse”, it made a perfect first home for Ecclestone’s daughter, Petra, and her husband James Stunt.
Though it had been redeveloped by Andrew Dunn and Alex Michelin, the “gilded youth” duo behind Finchatton, Ecclestone and Stunt made a number of alterations to the property including converting it from a five bedroom to a three bedroom residence. The entire third floor, rather unconventionally, is currently devoted to dressing rooms – plainly a change made to suit the fashion obsessive 24-year old.
Having bought another property, Sloane House on Old Church Street in Chelsea, from the recently ennobled JCB tycoon Lord Bamford in 2010, 63 Eaton Square was placed on the market with agents Knight Frank at a price of £32,000,000. Amongst those to have viewed was a “a fake Kazakh millionaire” according to the Evening Standard. He is said to have been called “Oleg”, arrived in a chauffeur driven Bentley and is alleged to have stolen some £500,000 of jewellery from one of the bedrooms.
A friend of Ecclestone, whose main home is the $85 million 57,000 square foot Spelling Manor in Holmby Hills, California, told the Mail Online:
“Petra was out with her sister Tamara a few weeks ago when the viewing took place. As soon as this man left, it was discovered that the jewellery, which was on a bedroom nightstand, was missing”
Of the incident, Ecclestone’s spokesman added:
“The theft occurred at the London house during a property viewing. The family were not home at the time. No further comment will be made”.
Amazingly, according to press reports, the incident has not been reported to the police and, according to the Evening Standard, “it is understood Petra is not claiming for the theft on insurance” as she was “worried about a media leak”.
Well, instead, we guess, this’ll just give Miss Ecclestone yet another excuse for a shopping jaunt to Harrods.
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Where even the Lions fear to tread. Reporting the theft to the Police means an investigation of the scene of the crime. It is better to let sleeping dogs be.