The Steeple Times

Tag: house

  • The battleaxe in the Beemer

    The battleaxe in the Beemer

    Matthew Steeples examines the truth behind Liz Jones giving up on her “rural idyll”

     

    The Mail’s Liz Jones is a waspish woman who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. Those who’ve paid even a moment’s attention to her bleating, will be familiar with lines such as: “Last week, my brand new £1,300 MacBook Pro broke” and “Phil Spencer wanted his £46,000 and he wanted it now!” She never stops talking about money and the size of what she both owns and owes.

     

    Liz Jones

    In today’s Femail, Jones bores on about about how she feels “like a cross-dresser” trying out the Kardashian Kollection of clothing in a pointed attack on Kim Kardashian, but it was for her diatribe yesterday that she truly got the goat of the nation in “[bidding] a ferocious farewell” to life in the country in an article entitled “Goodbye… and good riddance!” 2,151 people have commented so far and most of them have been far from sympathetic.

     

    When Upcott Farm at Brushford, near Dulverton in Somerset came up for sale in 2007 at a price of £1.6 million, it featured in an article by The Telegraph’s Caroline McGhie. The 5-bedroomed farmhouse came with a 2-bedroom annexe, a courtyard of barns and stables and 47 acres of land. McGhie waxed lyrical about the merits of moving to this location: “People come here for the peace and quiet, the night skies, the dramatic coastline, and they work from home,” she stated before adding: “You can find everything here, including butchers, bakers, afternoon tea and cake, fish and chips, an art gallery and a shop selling fishing tackle.” Of Upcott Farm itself, she concluded:

     

    “This would suit a member of the new wave of buyers dubbed Droppies (Disillusioned Relatively Ordinary Professionals Preferring Independent Employment Situations).”

     

    McGhie got it half right: Upcott Farm sold to someone who considers herself far from “relatively ordinary” and someone who is far from “professional.” The purchaser, however, was certainly someone who’d become “disillusioned” with what she’d bought and someone whose desire to be “independent” and create a “situation” just alienated all she encountered. The buyer, you’ve guessed it, was none other than Elizabeth Ann Jones.

     

    Jones was born in Brentwood, Essex in 1958 and studied journalism at the London College of Printing. She became editor of Marie Claire in 1999 but was sacked, she herself suggests, for “listing in the magazine the freebies she had been offered in the previous month.” Here, it seems, began Jones’s obsession with all things material and here she also met an Indian BBC radio journalist named Nirpal Dhaliwal in 2000.

     

    Jones married Dhaliwal but the union was to prove an “utter disaster” as he had affairs with women she terms “younger, dimmer [and] slimmer.” “I’m no racist” Jones was divorced in 2007 and said goodbye to her “3,000 square foot of Islington real estate” and “easy, if super-busy, London life” in favour of the green, green grass of Somerset.

     

    Upcott Farm, Brushford, Dulverton, Somerset, TA22 9RS

    Whoever’s side you see it from, five years of hell followed. Jones baited the locals and they grew to loathe her. She wrote columns and a book, The Exmoor Files, where she attacked them as “faintly Amish… feral, old and smelly” and another hack and neighbour, Jane Alexander of The Telegraph, responded: “Dulverton [was] positively fizzing with fury” after each and every publication.

     

    Of the local restaurants, Jones stated:

     

    “I have given up trying to eat out in restaurants here on Exmoor… It is still stuck in the Seventies, with only things in baskets and rum babas on the menu… If you tell the waiter you are vegetarian, you are stared at, incredulously, as if you are black.”

     

    She whinged about her inability to find love:

     

    ”I will never, ever meet a man here in the middle of a moor, where even to be in possession of your own teeth is a bonus.”

     

    And whined about fieldsports:

     

    “I didn’t increase my popularity by being unable to pass a party of men and often children with guns, shooting rabbits and deer, without getting out of my BMW and saying: ‘Do you really have nothing better to do with your Saturday morning?’ The look of shock on their faces that I had the cheek to challenge them was priceless. I would stop, too, and shout at huntsmen on horses, galloping on tarmaced roads, one hand on the reins, the other clamping a mobile phone to their heads. ‘You will ruin your horses’ tendons!’ I would wail.”

     

    Whilst Jones found little to like in her new community, they found nothing positive in her arrival either. Her dog was blamed for worrying lambs, and Jones’s inability to control it, locals say, was an indicator of the chasm between her life and theirs. In 2009, one neighbour went as far as to tell Danny Brierley of The Independent:

     

    “We have got nothing in common with her, really. I think she may find it difficult to make any kind of life here now. She is not a very friendly person and we are all sick to death of talking about Liz Jones. A hatred has been building up for months. She is actually having a go at people and they are not going to tolerate that. She has feelings like all people, of course she has. But everyone wants her to leave and leave now. No one can make her, but we think she will go. I don’t see how you can live in such a small community with people who think that way about you.”

     

    Matters came to a head when Jones’s precious black BMW convertible, “bought in 2005 for £26,000,” was pelted with eggs and teenagers fired shots at her letterbox with an air rifle. A local councilor even dressed up as her in the local carnival and yesterday Jones took revenge on those she blames for her “five-year prison sentence” and deprivation from Space NK, Cath Kidston and Illy coffee.

     

    Instead, the article just shows the true reality of this bombastic harpy. The lines Jones penned speak for themselves. Country people don’t welcome someone who planned to “hack for miles across the open moorland in my Prada jodhpurs” anymore than the folk of Knightsbridge welcome Arabs treating their roads like racetracks. The gardener who had to endure Jones yelling “walk faster!” at him didn’t deserve such anymore than a bus driver in SW11 deserves abuse from his passengers. Jones concludes:

     

    “I’m now a different person. I became so lonely. I would often get in my car, not just for the warmth, but for the kind voice of the satnav lady. I’ve learned that an amazing view and a pair of nesting grey herons are not enough to make me happy.”

     

    27 acres of land including paddocks and a fishing lake remain on the market through Savills and Strutt & Parker at a price of £200,000 at Upcott Farm

    Miss Jones bleats that she’s taken a £500,000 loss on Upcott Farm, which languished on the market at first at £1,900,000 and then £1,750,000 for three years. The “unexpected” sale of the property has given her the ability to “flee back to the city” but the locals and even the “Droopies” should be warned: there’s still 27 acres of the farm unsold and on the market at a price of £200,000. Halloween may have passed but the battleaxe in the Beemer could still call again.

     

    Read yesterday’s “Goodbye… and good riddance!” article by Liz Jones for the Mail on Sunday at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2231033/Goodbye–good-riddance-During-catastrophic-years-country-Liz-Jones-greeted-gun-attack-relentless-abuse-Now-flees-city-bids-ferocious-farewell.html

     

    To purchase Liz Jones’s book, The Exmoor Diaries, go to: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Exmoor-Files-Husband-Found-Rural/dp/0297854437

     

    For more information about the remaining 27 acres at Upcott Farm, contact Strutt & Parker on +44 (0) 1392 976005 or go to: http://www.primelocation.com/for-sale/details/18314693?search_identifier=71cbb8a2fb43a12182bfa7b79b5de0a3

  • Which bear will take the 13th seat?

    Which bear will take the 13th seat?

    Could the number 13 be the reason Halcyon Hall has failed to sell?

     

    Several over the top Californian residences we’ve featured on The Steeple Times, namely the $40,000,000 Chateau d’Or in Bel Air and the $87,000,000 Villa del Lago on the Newport coast, were properties that have seen huge price reductions. Though $15,000,000 has been sliced off the asking price of the Bel Air pad, it remains unsold and meanwhile Villa del Lago, now renamed One Pelican Hill Road, achieved just $18.5 million in a bankruptcy auction. It sold for less than a quarter of what the developer originally sought for it.

     

    The 25,000 square foot Chateau d’Or, 10425 West Sunset Boulevard, Bel Air, Los Angeles, California, CA 90077 first came on the market at $40,000,000 in 2009. At $25,000,000, it still hasn’t sold.
    One Pelican Hill Road North, Newport Coast, Newport Beach, Orange County, California, CA 92657 was originally on the market for $87,000,000. It eventually sold at a bankruptcy auction for just $18,500,000 and features a 17,706 square foot Italianate mansion with 8 bedrooms and 17 bathrooms. Additional features number staff accommodation, a gatehouse, garaging for 17 cars, a 1-acre lake with terraced waterfalls, a tennis court, stabling and a riding area and a private vineyard with a wine cave.

    We believed monstrous white elephants like these were confined to the US, but we are afraid we’ve come across something today that truly proves otherwise. The behemoth we refer to is a 14,000 square foot house in Radlett, Hertfordshire. Built in 2005 for a businessman named Barry Beck, “Halcyon Hall” stands on the site of a far more modest property that was simply known as 11 Newlands Avenue.

     

    The phrase “halcyon days” refers to “the seven days of winter when storms never occur” in the Greek myth of Alycone but whether this inspired Beck in naming this place is unknown. He and his wife, Pauline, did, however, decide upon an “Elizabethan theme” for the residence and our pictures illustrate their extravagantly eccentric tastes adequately.

     

    Halcyon Hall, 11 Newlands Avenue, Radlett, Hertfordshire, WD7 8EH
    The entrance hall is guarded by a pair of knights in full suits of armour
    The hall and entertaining salon is far from understated
    The main staircase is guarded by a life-size bear
    The dining room attempts to look Elizabethan
    Whilst the kitchen dabbles with medieval meets “The Real Housewives of New York”
    Decorating mish-mash continues in a formal entertaining space
    And the “games gallery” isn’t exactly neutral either
    The master bedroom suite takes “over-the-top” to another level
    But it is the thirteen seat cinema that we find most curious

    Undoubtedly the construction of this vast Hertfordshire crib is of a high quality but the look is nothing other than ludicrous. Here is a mix of pastiche, ostentatiousness and just plain odd. Not even a WAG could have come up with décor this curious and such things as a private cinema with 13 seats can plainly not be the choice of someone who follows the curse of the hangman’s noose.

     

    This 7-bedroomed house, which stands in 1.17 acres, would strangely, though, be ideal for someone who is a little paranoid. As well as all the security features you’d expect of any multi-million pound mansion in the Home Counties, it also includes a bathroom that doubles as a panic room. If you close the door in a certain way, steel bars supposedly come down making sure no intruder can follow you inside.

     

    Two knights in full suits of armour guard the entrance hallway and a life-size stuffed bear stands dominant in the games gallery of the house. Plainly this beast’s not persuaded anyone to bite yet as whilst the price of Halcyon Hall has fallen from £15,000,000 in February 2011 to just under £13,000,000 in November 2012, the house remains on the market. We suspect that the curse of “Unlucky Thirteen” may well be alive and well somewhere between numbers 11 and 15 Newlands Avenue.

    Halcyon Hall, 11 Newlands Avenue, Radlett, Hertfordshire, WD7 8EH is for sale through Statons. For more information telephone: +44 (0) 20 8445 3694 or email: [email protected]

  • Bond's base

    A home suitable for James Bond

     

    The latest James Bond film Skyfall is the talk of the town and it’s received many a rave review. The fictional James Bond allegedly lived in Royal Avenue, off the Kings Road in SW3, but if he were looking for a house today, we think 9 Hillgate Street would be the perfect pad.

     

    The entrance and garage at 9 Hillgate Street, London, W8 7SP. Sadly the Aston Martin isn’t included in the £7,950,000 asking price.
    Daniel Craig in a promotional shot for “Skyfall”
    The unasuming exterior of 9 Hillgate Street gives little away about what lies behind it

    Utterly unassuming from the street, what lies behind the exterior of this four-storey building is deceptively a new build house constructed in 2010. Designed by Seth Stein Architects, the property is only 18ft wide but an amazing 85ft in length.

     

    An internal lightwell and four terraces are amongst the features of the house
    A reception room in the house
    A bright walkway allows light to flood into the building
    The master bedroom suite includes a bedroom, study, dressing area and bathroom
    Seth Stein Architects have developed a vast residence out of the tiniest of spaces

    Bond would greatly appreciate the lower ground media room and gym with plunge pool and with a staff suite, there’s room to house someone to mix his martinis. A vast 29ft by 16ft living room is open plan to the kitchen and perfect for entertaining but it is most certainly the master bedroom suite that would make the perfect spot for his extra curricular activities. Four terraces arranged around a courtyard provide ample outdoor space and with all manner of techonological gadgets, 9 Hillgate Street most certainly would make an ideal bachelor pad.

     

    What truly would suit Bond perfectly, though, in this 4,286 square foot £7,950,000 house is the garage. Cleverly disguised and decorated as a normal room, there’s even an Aston sat waiting parked there. Daniel Craig should put in a bid.

     

    9 Hillgate Street, London, W8 7SP is on the market with Domus Nova. Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7727 1717. For more details, go to: http://www.primelocation.com/for-sale/details/16234784?search_identifier=1dc68e7f093f381788be3dda54be33ed

     

    For more information about Seth Stein Architects, go to: http://www.sethstein.com

  • Nad's not that Mad

    Matthew Steeples suggests that Nadine Dorries is perhaps right to head for the jungle

     

    Don’t get me wrong: I think Nadine Dorries is an utter loon. For those who haven’t heard of her, she’s the MP for Mid-Bedfordshire and a bit of a mouthpiece. Her entry on our roll call attracted over 8,000 hits yesterday and that alone is clear indication that she, unlike the majority of dimwits that occupy the Houses of Parliament, is an MP who gets noticed.

     

    Nadine Dorries heads for the jungle

    “Gets noticed,” I hear you splutter. Yes, she’s someone who loves the limelight and doesn’t care whom she offends. She’s best known for having described David Cameron and George Osborne as a pair of “arrogant posh boys” who “don’t know the price of milk” and is regularly derided for her “maverick” ways. Here is a woman who gets compared to Ann Widdecombe and Edwina Currie and one that hasn’t let her party tell her what to do.

     

    In the House of Commons she’s achieved little apart from becoming a figure of fun. She’s commonly known as “Mad Nad” and the media reel her out whenever they fancy a bit of sport. Dorries can be relied upon to produce lines such as: “[I’m] not an MP for any other reason other than because God wants me to be” and these indeed are classic examples of her idiocy.

     

    On Tuesday, it was announced that Ms. Dorries, on full parliamentary pay, has headed off to Australia to participate in the ITV1 television series I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! For this, she’s pocketing a fee of circa £40,000 and will, without doubt, rake in a lot more in appearance fees and for interviews on her return. MPs and the media derided this move but I congratulate her.

     

    Martha Payne

    I cannot disagree with those who state that she’d be fired if she were in a normal job and just disappeared for a month, but “Mad Nad” has realised that the Conservative Party is not the place for her. She has plainly come to the conclusion that the House of Commons is nothing other than a chamber full of hot air and that to get things changed, you follow the example of the schoolgirl Martha Payne and use technology and the media to the max. With NeverSeconds, this fearless 9-year old took on the might of a council and improved school dinners. In the meantime, MPs haven’t even been able to come up with an appropriate solution to restore the Houses of Parliament, let alone solve a nation in the midst of economic meltdown.

     

    Frankly, we have too many MPs in this country and they don’t work hard enough. In total, there are 650 and this corresponds to one for every 68,000 parliamentary electors. It would be better to halve this number and double the pay of the remainder. We’d get better quality people applying to be our representatives and people like “Mad Nad” would be a thing of the past. Nadine Dorries isn’t an A-list “celebrity” but she should most certainly stick to the jungle.

     

    Follow Nadine Dorries on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/nadinedorriesmp

  • Boujis in the basement?

    Boujis in the basement?

    Matthew Steeples explores the story of an empty Kensington mansion

     

    A multi-million pound 8-bedroomed house in Kensington isn’t anything unusual. In fact, rather, they’re ten a penny. In this, one of the wealthiest boroughs in the land, large, expensive homes are just the norm.

     

    An image of the existing exterior of No. 1 Campden Hill, London, W8 7AD
    A rendered image of how the exterior of the renovated property might look
    The plans show a vast subterranean development that will vastly increase the size of No. 1 Campden Hill

    No. 1 Campden Hill, which is being marketed for an undisclosed eight-figure sum, is in a quite different league. Here is a detached Edwardian house in an acre of grounds just to the north of Kensington High Street. It’s an unrenovated property but it attracted much press attention in October 2011 because it was place on the market in October 2011 at a price of £75,000,000. Yes, you heard it right: £75 million for a fixer-upper. Last week, Radio 4 made a hell of a fuss about a derelict semi-detached house in Newcastle selling for just £14,000 so this truly must be something special.

     

    Architect Edward P. Warren (1856 – 1937), far right, in the offices of Bodley & Garner, 14 South Square, Gray’s Inn, London

    The architect of the house Edward Prioleau Warren (1856 – 1937), a Bristol born architect and archaeologist, was best known for “Oxford colleges and minor country houses” but also designed the War Cemetery at Basra. He was a friend and adviser to the American novelist Henry James and in addition to building No. 1 Campden Hill in 1915, he also designed a house at 5 Palace Green in 1906 and another, Estcort House in Kensington Palace Gardens, in 1904. Warren’s guiding style is described as having been to recreate an “understated revival of English late 17th century” architecture and at No. 1 Campden Hill he created just that.

     

    Colonel Edmond Grove-Hills (1864 – 1922), born Edmond Hills, and his wife, Juliet Spencer-Bell, were the architect’s clients. A plaque on the building bares their names and the following dedication:

     

    This House I built for Me & Mine

    May it be of Peace A Shrine

    And no Enmity or Sin

    Ever find its way therein

    AD 1915

     

    Sadly for the Grove-Hills, the following year, their son, Second Lieutenant Charles Herbert-Hills (1895 – 1916) was killed on the Somme aged just 21. His father, meanwhile, was awarded a CBE in 1918 after having served as the Assistant Chief Engineer of Eastern Command during the war.

     

    Aside from his military exploits, Edmond Grove-Hills is best known for his role as president of the Royal Astronomical Society. He took part in observations of eclipse of the sun in Japan in 1896, India in 1898 and Russia in 1914 and contributed papers analysing both this and the causes of the irregular movements of the earth’s axis of rotation.

     

    In 1951, No. 1 Campden Hill was purchased by the government of Uruguay and it became the residence of their ambassador to the United Kingdom. For the next fifty years the building was barely altered but when the lease from the Phillimore Kensington Estate came to an end, there were legal problems as the 1951 transfer had never been stamped. Of this, Sharon Mulroney of Forsters, the legal representatives of Phillimore, commented:

     

    “It is highly unusual to be faced with complications of this kind when dealing with a registered London title, but this made the transaction all the more fascinating. Even the decision to allow ambassadorial staff to return to the property for security purposes after completion was fraught with potential problems about security of tenure, employment and tax.”

     

    The proposed site plan shows the addition of a garden pavilion, staff/security cottage and a tennis court

    Eventually, without issue, the Phillimore Estate sold on the house in 2001 for a price of approximately £17,000,000. In the years since, the property was effectively mothballed as all the purchasers have done is to have obtained planning permission to redevelop the building into a mammoth mansion of epic proportions.

     

    A computer rendered image of how the drawing room might look
    The “leisure area” is reminiscent of the entrance to The Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park Hotel
    The private home cinema would be the envy of any movie buff
    The swimming pool
    The wine cellar is rather like a contemporary take on Berry Bros. & Rudd’s flagship store in St. James’s Street
    And to complete it all… The plans include your own version of Boujis in the basement

    The approved plans show designs for something quite remarkable. Warren’s “understated” residence will be replaced with 8 vast bedroom suites, grand entertaining spaces, a lift and even bedrooms for 5 staff. In addition to a full-scale renovation of the original freehold house, there is scope to provide a total of 30,000 square feet of accommodation by adding a huge subterranean complex that will include a 25-metre swimming pool, court, squash court, gym, sauna, steam room, function room, entertainment room, home cinema, wine tasting room and even a nightclub to rival any of Kensington’s trendiest haunts.

     

    On that basis alone, No. 1 Campden Hill is surely the ideal residence for Prince Harry: “Who needs Boujis?” we hear him cry.

     

    No. 1 Campden Hill, London, W8 7AD is for sale through Knight Frank. For more details contact Roddy Craggs on +44 (0) 20 7938 4311 or go to: http://search.knightfrank.com/ken100161 to download a brochure.

     

    For more information about The Phillimore Estate, go to: http://www.phillimore-kensington-estate.co.uk

  • Windows on the WAGs

    Windows on the WAGs

    A £15 million mansion fit for a self-made tycoon or an upwardly mobile WAG

     

    While the youth of the Kings Road and Loughton have featured in the reality shows Made in Chelsea and The Only Way is Essex, their counterparts in Cheshire have yet to undergo the same social experiment. Having come across a fair few of their number though, I can only imagine their antics would result in television of comparable car crash proportions.

     

    Wayne and Coleen Rooney and their home on Collar House Drive in Prestbury, East Cheshire
    Warrington born Kerry Katona isn’t considered one of the “Cheshire set’s” finest exports

     

    Cheshire itself is a county of contrasts: there’s the farming and hunting set and then there’s the new money. From the 1950s onwards an invasion of nouveau riche footballers and self-made business people came to Alderley Edge and Wilmslow and it is said that there are more Rolls-Royces per square mile here than anywhere else in the UK.

     

    Though today’s Coronation Street actresses and Man United players generally favour brand new homes in Prestbury, the new wealth have not just consigned themselves to such. The likes of Take That’s Gary Barlow, for a time, owned Delamere Manor at Cuddington but sold it in 2005 due to his ever-growing commitments elsewhere. Equally, Neil Hamilton, whilst MP for Tatton, lived at The Old Rectory at Nether Alderley with his formidable wife Christine but when their days in politics came to an end, they too moved on. For a time, David and Victoria Beckham were the undoubted glitterati of this manor, but of those footballers still resident Wayne and Coleen Rooney are definitely now the best known.

     

    Swettenham Hall, Swettenham, Congleton, Cheshire, CW12 2JZ
    Double glazing tycoon Brian Kennedy

     

    In a “grey area between old and new” sits Swettenham Hall at Swettenham near Congleton. This 12,590 square foot Georgian mansion dates to 1795 but since it was acquired by Brian Kennedy, a double glazing, home improvements and mobile telephone entrepreneur, the house has been given a total makeover. The colourful style he’s given the house can best be described as being akin to: “Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen meets Austin Powers.”

     

    Swettenham Hall’s drawing room is decorated and furnished in a cacophony of colours
    The kitchen is painted in an equally vivid shade of lime green
    A bedroom boasts a carpet that would make Austin Powers shout: “Yeah, baby, yeah!”
    The same carpeting continues into the wood paneled “gentleman’s study”
    At Swettenham Hall, bathrooms, equally, are far from neutral in their styling
    Mr Kennedy and his wife Christine employed Julian Bicknell Associates to design an impressive leisure wing in 2004

     

    Swettenham Hall is most definitely a party palace and along with the addition of a leisure wing consisting of a swimming pool, Jacuzzi®, plunge pool, steam room and gymnasium in 2004, Kennedy has also constructed a 47ft by 44ft helicopter hangar complete with a retractable helicopter pad.

     

    Standing in 100 acres of grounds, the house does seem a tad expensive at £15 million especially since that the adjoining former farm buildings were sold off and converted into eight homes in 1999. The driveway is partly shared with these homes and for those seeking the ultimate in privacy, this could indeed be an issue. It is perhaps why Swettenham Hall has yet to sell.

     

    The former farm buildings next to Swettenham Hall were sold off and converted into eight homes by Egerton Estates and Watts Developments in 1999
    The proximity of Swettenham Hall to the neighbouring barn conversions is illustrated in this Google Earth map

    Brian Kennedy is someone I hadn’t heard of until I came across Swettenham Hall but here is a fascinating man whose meteoric rise is frankly very clearly linked to windows. The son of a window cleaner from Edinburgh, this self-made tycoon started his career as a trainee manager at the Royal Bank of Scotland. He subsequently briefly worked as a trainee accountant but left when offered the chance to become youngest branch manager of Moben Kitchens at the age of 20.

     

    At around this time, Kennedy acquired a stake in Farouche Kitchens and with a Rochdale born property entrepreneur named David Russell, he was transformed from a door-to-door salesman to a pioneer in direct sales. In 1988, when Farouche was sold, Kennedy netted circa £1 million. From here, this entrepreneur returned to his family’s roots by venturing into double glazing with Weatherseal Windows and then home improvements with Space Kitchens & Bedrooms.

     

    In 1999, with the help of funds raised by private equity investors 3i, Kennedy paid £42 million for the well known brand Everest but sold part of his stake to the management for £63 million in 2003. In due course he added to his shareholding and then sold 21.5% of the company to Hutton Collins in a deal which valued the company at £150 million in 2007.

     

    Ever the empire builder, Kennedy paid £29 million for a conservatory manufacturer named Ultrafame in 2006 and then also added another double glazing brand, Zenith Staybrite, to his portfolio in 2008. Many other business ventures followed but not being afraid to diversify, Kennedy formed Patrick Properties, whose portfolio is now valued in excess of £100 million, in 2002 and Kennedy Renewables, which specialises in wind energy, in 2009.

     

    In the technology sector, a chance conversation in a Knutsford wine bar in 1995 led to him venturing into the mobile telephone market with a company named Genesis Communications. The business was sold to Dixons in 2002 for £31 million.

     

    In January 2012, Kennedy merged his main Latium Holdings business with Jim Rawson’s Epwin Group to form Epwin Holdings. The merger resulted in a company with more than 2,500 employees and brands numbering Spectus, Swish, CET and Kestrel.

     

    Of his success, Kennedy states:

     

    “Business is common sense [and] dealing with people is common sense. I don’t think I have any particular flair. I think it is about common sense, taking the opportunity when it comes and hard work.”

     

    Brian Kennedy’s wealth has allowed him to indulge many of his passions. A period of semi-retirement “drove [him] and [his] kids nuts,” but this Scotsman’s love of rugby resulted in him acquiring the Sale Sharks Rugby Club in 1999. He is said to have set the “club on a sound financial footing” and turned it into “one of the leading rugby clubs in Britain.”

     

    Philanthropy is something that Kennedy, a Jehovah’s Witness, has also dedicated his wealth to. Through his Brian Kennedy Trust, he has supported a number of charities and organisations but it is for his role as the main backer of Find Madeleine Fund that he has come to public attention. Of his reasoning for backing the missing child’s parents financially, he stated:

     

    “In light of the quite literally incredible accusations against Gerry and Kate McCann, which are clearly exacerbating their emotional torture, I felt compelled to offer, along with other like-minded businessmen, financial support and the full logistical support of the Latium team. That support is principally our in-house lawyer Ed Smethurst and [official spokesman] Clarence Mitchell.”

     

    Brian Kennedy was involved in the funding of a team that included Clarence Mitchell for the Find Madeleine Fund until 2009. Here Mitchell (standing) is pictured with Gerry and Kate McCann.
    An ex-lawyer and campaigner Anthony “Tony” Bennett is the former secretary of The Madeleine Foundation who has been involved in various legal disputes with Brian Kennedy and Gerry and Kate McCann

     

    Kennedy’s donation attracted much press attention in 2007 in the weeks following Madeleine McCann’s disappearance and he continues to support them to this day. A very public spat involving him, Gerry and Kate McCann and a campaigner named Tony Bennett, who also was involved in The Madeleine Foundation, has been the subject of various legal actions. In October 2011, Mr Bennett was forced to publicly apologise to Mr Kennedy and separately an August 2009 Evening Standard article by Mark Hollingsworth “investigat[ing] the investigators,” was pulled because for “legal and editorial reasons.” In it, “someone who worked closely with [Kennedy]” was quoted as saying:

     

    “He was appalled by the Portuguese police, but he also had visions of flying in by helicopter to rescue Madeleine.”

     

    Angelina Jolie, another avid aviator, once commented: “Wherever I am I find myself looking out of the window wishing I was somewhere else.” We do not know why Brian Kennedy is selling Swettenham Hall, but Jolie is indeed one of the few with the resources to take these particular windows off his hands.

     
    For more information about Swettenham Hall, Swettenham, Congleton, Cheshire, CW12 2JZ, contact Edward Welton of Knight Frank on +44 (0) 20 7861 1114.

     

    For more details about Brian Kennedy, go to: http://www.brian-kennedy.co.uk

     

    For more details about the Find Madeleine Fund go to: http://www.findmadeleine.com and for information on The Madeleine Foundation: http://www.madeleinefoundation.org.uk/

  • A manageable mansion

    A manageable mansion

    The sale of the £20 million Bletchingdon Park, Oxfordshire

     

    Bletchingdon Park House in Oxfordshire is one of those classic Palladian villas that would make the perfect setting for a period drama. Unlike vast Jacobean mansions like Highclere Castle, better known as Julian Fellowes’ Downton Abbey, however, Bletchingdon is of a far more manageable size.

     

    The facade of Bletchingdon Park, Bletchingdon, Kidlington, Oxfordshire, OX5 3DW
    The staircase hall
    A formal reception room
    The grounds of Bletchingdon Park

    This Grade II* listed Georgian house, built for Lord Valentina in 1782, may be some 24,600 square foot in size, but it has a layout that makes it both practical for living and suitable for entertaining on a grand scale. The accommodation, which has been renovated by the renowned building company Symm, includes 9 bedrooms and suites, well-proportioned formal reception rooms and a garden floor with further reception rooms, a billiards room and a fitness room with spa.

     

    Whilst the original stable block has been sold off and converted to residential accommodation, Bletchingdon Park includes 2 staff flats, a 2-bedroomed lodge cottage and a further 3-bedroomed cottage. With parkland and grounds extending to 127 acres, maintaining Bletchingdon’s plot is large, but easily maintained.

     

    Dr Michael Peagram with Albert II, Prince of Monaco and Prince Andrew, The Duke of York
    The former stables of Bletchingdon Park were sold off some years ago and have been converted into a number of homes

    In the 20th century Bletchingdon was owned by Lord Astor and then Lord Rotherwick. The current owner, Dr Michael Peagram, purchased the estate in 1993. Peagram made his fortune in the chemicals industry after having led a management buyout of Huddersfield based Holliday Chemicals Holdings (HCH) in 1987. He revitalised the business, expanded into new markets and floated the company in 1993. The business was ultimately sold to Yule Catto for £225 million in 1997 and in 2001 Peagram sold another company for a reported £44 million.

     

    At this point, this scientist turned tycoon moved to Monaco and saved himself, according to a 2009 Daily Mail article by Piers Morgan, some £13 million in capital gains tax. A wise businessman and a supporter of David Cameron, Peagram’s modus operandi is:

     

    “Winning with honour and playing by the rules… And not cheating.”

     

    In an interview with Monaco’s NeXt Generation Entrepreneur Forum, he states that he “did lots of work” to achieve his success but admits to “being a romantic at heart.” He has used much of his fortune to fund the philanthropic activities of Outward Bound Monaco with Prince Andrew, The Duke of York and Albert II, Prince of Moanco.

     

    Peagram placed Bletchingdon Park on the market in May 2012 at a price of £20 million. Of why it hasn’t sold, one blogger commented that a footpath runs close to the house and that there is a lack of leisure facilities and outbuildings. Somehow neither seem insurmountable and whoever purchases this fine residence will be a very lucky man. If I were Dr Peagram, though, I’d keep it.

     

    Bletchingdon Park, Bletchingdon, Kidlington, Oxfordshire, OX5 3DW is for sale through Knight Frank. For further details contact Damian Gray on +44 (0) 20 7629 8171 and to download a brochure go to: http://search.knightfrank.com/cho090098

     

     

  • Breakdancing stoats

    Breakdancing stoats

    Charles Mitford Cust tells of the breakdancing stoats at Bears Rock

     

    Apparently the 2012 “Braun Battle of the Year” breakdance championship is underway and the coolest movers are strutting their stuff right now down in Montpelier, France.

     

    “B-boying” or “breakdancing” as we recognise it today is a relatively new dance style which can trace its roots to James Brown’s Get on the Good Foot dance of 1969. There is, however, another species that has been practising the art for considerably longer and that is the stoat.

     

    A dancing stoat "Stan style" ©Tristan Bantock
    A dancing stoat “Stan style” ©Tristan Bantock

     

    The stoat is one of nature’s acrobats, with a level of agility, dexterity and stamina which places it in a class of it’s own in the animal kingdom. It is also incredibly strong. A stoat is quite capable of killing and dragging home a creature 10 times its size and weight.

     

    Although stoats, with their immaculately groomed ermine coats and pretty little black tails look almost unbearably cute and charming, they are also one of the most ruthless killers ever created. You see the stoat doesn’t dance just to amuse itself; it literally dances for its supper. For this reason, the stoat is and has to be the best “B-boyer” in the world.

     

    Stoats dance around potential victims in order to hypnotise them. They put on such dazzling displays of acrobatics, including the famous “headspin” that defines “breaking” that your average rabbit becomes so mesmerised that it allows the stoat to dance closer and closer. The next thing the bunny knows is that the “B-boy” stoat has sunk his teeth deep into its throat and then is on a one-way ticket to the great Watership Down in the sky. Nice.

     

    Stoats have danced their way through 7 million years of survival, and like so many highly successful predators, such as sharks and crocodiles, having once established their evolutionary niche and perfected their modus operandi, they have remained pretty much unchanged in all that time. We can therefore safely assume that stoats even breakdanced their way through the last ice age, during which time, according to the experts, they faired very well as a species with their compact dimensions and standard issue ermine to insulate them from the sub-zero temperatures. Seems like the Ice Age animation series should have featured a stoat rather than a sloth.

     

    About six months ago, a stoat, whom I have christened Stan, moved to Bears Rock. He is obviously a discerning type of chap because having looked all around the grounds for a suitable home, he decided to move into the basement of my wooden African style rondavel which sits on an elevated veranda overlooking my lake.

     

    Stan and Stella’s crib

    From this strategic vantage point, he, and Stella, as I have named his wife, have a lovely view of the lower garden some fifty feet below them in the mornings and can decide which of my rabbits they are going to eat for lunch.

     

    “Just popping out for a spot of busking Stella,” says Stan as he heads out. “Alright Stan,” Stella responds: “But be as quick as you can love: I need you to gnaw a bigger back exit for us in case that Charles bloke buys a Jack Russell.”

     

    I am sure that another reason why Stan found this des res so appealing is because the surrounding timber balustrade makes such a wonderful place to train their young, the kits, in acrobatics and the art of artistic killing.

     

    I have often watched enthralled by the dazzling high-speed display he and Stella put on as they free run all over the structure, often appearing to defy the laws of gravity and physics. They make a welcome interlude to my day trading routine, although they have probably cost me a fortune in bad trades. I now eagerly look forward to watching the kits getting their schooling from mum and dad in the spring.

     

    One thing is certain, it is lucky for the competitors in Montpelier that there isn’t an entry category for stoats: Stan and Stella would wipe the floor with the lot of them.

     

    Watch a BBC One video of breakdancing stoats at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHImJVJSJ08

     

    The 2012 Braun Battle of the Year: http://www.braunbattleoftheyear.com/

  • First Among (Not So) Equals

    First Among (Not So) Equals

    The latest sale of 32a Ovington Square

     

    I first visited 32a Ovington Square in September 2009. At the time, this “hidden house” was the home of Lord Carrington and it had just come on the market at a price, if I recall correctly, of circa £3,000,000.

     

    The newly redeveloped Carrington House, 32a Ovington Square, London, SW3 1LR
    The Rt. Hon. The Lord Carrington KG, GCMG, CH, MC, PC, DL (born 6th June 1919) with his wife Lady Carrington (1920 – 2009) and their dog Edward

     

    A friend was looking for somewhere to buy in London and I’d somehow come across the aforementioned property in a magazine. A detached house in Knightsbridge at this price seemed like a bargain and as he was keen to take a look and I lived round the corner, we arranged to see it together.

     

    During this period, I had unfortunately made the mistake of making the acquaintance of a former ambassador’s wife who thought herself rather grand. Said woman somehow found out about my friend going to what Americans might term an “open house” at 32a Ovington Square and somehow muscled in. This individual happened to be selling her own home nearby and I reckon she, like my friend, thought she’d be onto a bargain. She’d previously unsuccessfully tried to persuade my friend to buy her individually styled, Ralph Lauren wallpapered home but as it actually rattled every time an underground train went underneath and as it was far from a bargain, he’d sensibly declined.

     

    We arrived at the 2,240 square foot 32a Ovington Square to be told by a rather unhelpful estate agent that we’d have to just wander round by ourselves and that there was no brochure or floor plan. As a merry throng trailed through the house, Lord Carrington stood in the garden looking bemused and his secretary fussed around him. The pair plainly weren’t comfortable with all the interlopers and all in all, who could blame them.

     

    The ex-ambassador’s wife, whose carelessness Rupert Everett most amusingly made reference to in his recent memoirs, spent the entire visit whingeing about the house being dark and stinking of damp. I had to agree with her as the neighbouring buildings towered over it and there was mould on the walls. My friend simply said: “It needs a fortune spending on it.” We left and later I heard that it sold for well above the asking price. The wife of the ex-ambassador thankfully departed from our lives soon after.

     

    A site plan shows how hidden away 32a Ovington Square truly is – ideal for a government minister or indeed a wayward celebrity

     

    About a year and a half later, I saw 32a Ovington Square for sale with planning permission to construct a far larger residence with a basement and sub-basement pool complex. The price was in the order of £14,000,000. I thought that somewhat ludicrous but now that the very same property is on the market at a price of £23,00,000, it seems that the world has just gone mad.

     

    The brochure for the new residence, which has been renamed, Carrington House, reveals a three-storey low-built freehold building with 5,300 square foot of accommodation. Though 32a Ovington Square has been more than doubled in size by a developer named London City Developments, the sub-basement leisure complex has not been constructed. Could this have been because of planning problems or simply because such construction wasn’t deemed to add value?

     

    In August 2002, Lord Carrington, whom The Mirror described as being  “doddery” in a Scurra diary piece, was said to have objected to a bar named Townhouse behind his former home being given a 1am licence. That bar has since closed but as seven of the residents of Ovington Square and Beauchamp Place also took a dislike to the prospect of subterranean developments at his former home, only proposals for a single basement level were included in the January 2010 plans submitted by a Mr & Mrs R. Garner.

     

    Jeffrey Archer’s 1984 novel “First Among Equals” (published in the UK by Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN: 0-340-35266-3)

     

    Aside from controversy with residents and planning officials, this “heavily overlooked,” “dark” house gets a brief credit in Jeffrey Archer’s 1984 novel, First Among Equals:

     

    “Charles would not have normally accepted the invitation. Lately he found cocktail parties to consist of nothing but silly little bits of food, never being able to get the right drink and rarely enjoying the trivial conversation. But when he glanced on his mantelpiece and saw an ‘At Home’ from Lady Carrington he felt it might be an amusing break from the routine he had fallen into since Fiona left. He was keen to discover more about the rumoured squabbles in Cabinet over expenditure cuts. He checked his tie in the mirror, removed an umbrella from the hat stand and left Eaton Square for Ovington Square… He arrived at Lord Carrington’s front door a little after six forty-five. A maid answered his knock, and he walked straight through to a drawing room that could have held fifty guests and very nearly did. He even managed to be served with the right blend of whiskey before joining his colleagues from both the Upper and Lower Houses.”

     

    Turning to the real Lord Carrington, here is a man who has led a remarkable life. He served as Foreign Secretary in Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet between 1979 and 1982 and as Secretary General of NATO from 1984 to 1988. The last surviving member of the Cabinets of both Harold Macmillan and Sir Alec Douglas-Home was British High Commissioner in Australia between 1956 and 1959 and also chaired the 1979 Lancaster House conference that brought Zimbabwe’s revolutionary war to an end. In 1991, Carrington presided over diplomatic talks in the former Yugoslavia and commented:

     

    “When I first talked to Presidents Milošević and Tudjman, it was quite clear that both of them had a solution which was mutually satisfactory – which was that they were going to carve up Bosnia between them.”

     

    Lord Carrington at his desk in 32a Ovington Square, Knightsbridge
    The Manor House, Bledlow, Buckinghamshire, HP27 9PB is the country home of Lord Carrington

     

    Milošević was found dead in his cell in 2006 but it is quite possible that Lord Carrington’s name will be mentioned in the trial of Goran Hadzic at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia that has just commenced at The Hague. It is amazing to think that matters involving this 93-year old politician are still current but Carrington’s stamina is shown in his roles as the longest serving member of the House of Lords and the second longest serving member of the Privy Council after HRH The Duke of Edinburgh.

     

    Aside from politics, there is much on the internet, a considerable amount of it written by wildcards and fantasists whose number includes David Icke, about Carrington’s involvement with Henry Kissinger, the Illuminati, the Bilderberg Group and the Committee of 300. The consensus of these conspiracy theorists generally borders on the ludicrous, but it is without doubt that Lord Carrington had and continues to have influence in many high places. He was chairman of Christie’s International PLC from 1988 to 1993 and has held directorships on the boards of companies that have included Barclays Banks PLC, Hambros PLC, Cadbury Schweppes PLC, Amalgamated Metal Corporation PLC, British Metal Corpoation PLC, Rio Tinto PLC, Kissinger Associates Inc. and Hollinger Inc.

     

    The main entrance to Carrington House
    The main reception room of the house is decorated in a contemporary style and a far cry from the traditional decoration favoured by Lord and Lady Carrington
    An essential feature in any house priced over £10 million is a media room
    Carrington House now boasts a bar that any dignitary would envy
    The newly added basement level features an entertaining hall, dining room, bar, gym, media room and two bedroom suites
    The staircase is now lit by a glazed cupola
    The master bedroom
    The master bathroom
    Another bedroom, located at basement level, is decorated with a Scottish theme and has access to a shared courtyard
    The other suite that shares the courtyard is decorated with an “Out of Africa” theme complete with an image of a zebra and matching linen and upholstery
    Would the purchaser of a £23,000,000 home truly want an AstroTurf lawn?

     

    Following on from this rather over the top redevelopment, a new chapter has certainly begun at 32a Ovington Square. Whether it is bought by a popstar or a Russian oligarch, they’ll definitely not be anywhere nearly as equal to Lord Carrington in terms of their league of influence.

     

    Carrington House, 32a Ovington Square, London, SW3 1LR is for sale through Knight Frank. For further information contact Nick Vestey on +44 (0) 20 7591 8600. Full details of the house can be viewed at: http://search.knightfrank.com/sla100211

     

    For more details about the Carrington family’s Carrington Estates Ltd., go to: http://www.carington.co.uk/

  • Tarred by Paparazzi

    Tarred by Paparazzi

    The bonfire sale of a monster of a mansion that has had a $15 million price reduction

     

    A property was first built at 10425 West Sunset Boulevard in Lower Bel Air, Los Angeles in 1936. Here, in this most exclusive of districts, the homes of the prosperous residents are hidden from view and this address, this day, is no exception.

     

    One of the original owners of a house on this site, which has a main access from the cul-de-sac Revuelta Way, was William R. Wilkerson (1890 – 1962), a nightclub owner and founder of The Hollywood Reporter. A compulsive gambler, he is also credited with contributing to Hollywood’s “Golden Era” through the venues he opened. These included Vendome, Café Tocadero, Sunset House, Ciro’s, LaRue, L’Aiglon and most famously The Flamingo Hotel. An involvement here with the ruthless gangster Ben “Bugsy” Siegel (1906 – 1947) turned sour in 1946 and resulted in him having to flee to Paris in fear of his life. Siegel’s death allowed him to return to Los Angeles in 1947 and having “quit gambling cold turkey” following the birth of a son in 1951, he led a much quieter life. He is remembered as being a man who preferred his “beloved French poodles to any wife or friend.”

     

    Media mogul William R. Wilkerson (1890 – 1962) pictured with Marilyn Monroe (1926 – 1962)
    American film personality and the publisher of “The Hollywood Reporter” Beatrice “Tichi” Wilkerson Kassel (1926 – 2004)

    Wilkerson is first recorded as living at 10425 West Sunset Boulevard in the 1940 California Census with his fourth wife, Estelle Jackson Brown. He subsequently remained there with his fifth wife, Vivian DuBois, and sixth wife Beatrice “Tichi” Noble. After his death, Tichi Wilkerson (1926 – 2004) sold first 10425 West Sunset Boulevard and then, in 1988, The Hollywood Reporter for $26,700,000.

     

    Greg Bautzer (1911 – 1987) with Ginger Rogers (1911 – 1995)

    Another famous owner of 10425 West Sunset Boulevard was a “celebrity attorney” named Greg Bautzer (1911 – 1987). Bautzer is best known for having represented not only William R. Wilkerson but also Ginger Rogers, Ingrid Bergman, Joan Crawford, Kirk Kerkorian and Howard Hughes. He is described as having been “as dashing and popular as any successful Hollywood movie star” and was engaged to but did not marry the actresses Barbara Payton, Lana Turner and Dorothy Lamour. He did, however, make the actress Dana Wynter his second wife in 1956, then Buffy Cobb Chapman and finally Nicola Dantine. This “man-about-Beverly Hills,” it seems, was indeed plainly a magnet for anything dramatic.

     

    Philanthropist and Bernini owner Yousuf Tar

    The current owner of the house, which is now somewhat ludicrously named Chateau d’Or or The House of Gold, is a man named Yousuf Tar. The president of the “faux-Italian mall fixture Bernini men’s clothing [company],” bought 10425 West Sunset Boulevard in 1992 for $6,000,000 and set about creating what his realtor, Sally Forster Jones, calls a “cross between The White House and Versailles.” The resulting remodeled residence isn’t quite either but frankly combines a mixture of one of the palaces of the deceased tyrant Colonel Gadaffi and the set of Dynasty.

     

    The gaudy gates to Chateau d’Or, 10425 West Sunset Boulevard, Bel Air, Los Angeles, California, CA 90077, USA are an indication of the “tackiness” that lies behind
    A 600ft main driveway leads to the front of the house from Revuelta Way. Secondary access comes from West Sunset Boulevard.
    The garden elevation of the Chateau d’Or
    The exterior of Chateau d’Or is anything but understated

    Decorated throughout in a white and gold, the aim of the redesign was to create the look of an 18th century palace complete with acres of marble, columns, cupolas, gold leaft and mouldings. Instead, the interpretation looks more Chigwell-esque than Parisian and has simply attracted criticism and mockery. An example, such as this from Curbed.com, gives a guide to the opinion of the majority about this ugly monstrosity:

     

    “[The mansion] houses some of the cheapest-looking French-inspired interiors ever made, highlighted (or, rather, lowlighted) by a towering, clunky fireplace and a cartoon-worthy master suite, with gilded everything. Even San Simeon’s William Randolph Hearst would object to this level of pointless expenditure.”

     

    The dining hall is currently furnished with a $300,000 table capable of seating upto eighty for a formal dinner. With an entirely gold dinner service, realtor Sally Forster Jones comments: “Food tastes so much better off gold.”
    The opulent meets gaudy theme continues with a marble hallway and staircase
    A sitting room fit for Saddam Hussein
    Chateau d’Or’s double height media room is supposedly “styled like an opera house”
    The master bedroom suite is as nearly as large as most homes and is some 5,000 square foot in size
    No restraint is shown in the choice of bathroom fittings either

    Chateau d’Or, according to the listing on Forster Jones’s website, features 25,953 square foot of living space with 15 bedrooms and 16.5 bathrooms. There is a vast dining hall capable of seating upto 80 for a formal dinner which currently features a $300,000 dining table and a 1,600 square foot “oversized gourmet kitchen” complete with 800 square foot of cupboards, an “indoor sunlit gazebo” and a double Viking oven. A double height media room styled as an opera house has also been created and there’s also a cigar and wine tasting room. The Chateau d’Or is nothing other than a “home” on a lavish and ludicrous scale.

     

    The pool sits alongside a 6-bedroomed guest house
    Chateau d’Or also has it’s own championship tennis court
    One of numerous terraces

    In addition to a swimming pool, spa and gym, Chateau d’Or also has a championship tennis court, guest accommodation and 1.7 acres of grounds. Accessed by a 600ft driveway and surrounded by privacy walls plainly designed to keep prying eyes out, the house featured in Lady Gaga’s 2009 video for her song Paparazzi. Mr Tar plainly isn’t that private at all.

     

    Lady Gaga filmed the video for her 2009 song “Paparazzi” at Chateau d’Or
    Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (AKA Lady Gaga) in one of the “cheap looking” chairs at Chateau d’Or

    Not shy of renting the house out for other purposes, it has also been used for a photoshoot for Versace, a television advert for Foot Locker and Addidas starring Ken Jeong and as a venue for a Dubai themed party for Donald Trump where Christina Aguilera performed.

     

    Ken Jeong in a 2010 advert for Foot Locker and Addidas at Chateau d’Or
    Donald Trump, Sr. with his daughter Ivanka Trump and son Donald Trump, Jr. at a party at Chateau d’Or

    Yousuf Tar put Chateau d’Or on the market in 2009 for just shy of $40,000,000 and though Michael Jackson supposedly wanted to buy it to create a “new Neverland,” his sad demise meant that this fell through. Relisted repeatedly since and despite the best efforts of Sally Forster Jones, Chateau d’Or’s gaudiness plainly hasn’t appealed to the market.

     

    You’d had to have been gaga to have paid $40,000,000 for Chateau d’Or

    Reduced by nearly $15,000,000 to $25,000,000 this month, Chateau d’Or still doesn’t look like much of a bargain. Somehow, we suspect, it’ll have to be marked down a fair bit more before anyone’s even vaguely tempted.

     

    For more information Chateau d’Or, 10425 West Sunset Boulevard, Bel Air, Los Angeles, California, CA 90077, USA contact Sally Forster Jones of the SFJ Group at +1 (310) 281 3999 or email her at: [email protected]

     

    Visit the official website for the house at: http://www.lechateaudor.com

     

    Watch a tour of Chateau d’Or by Sally Forster Jones at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjOAf_cfm0Q

     

    Watch Lady Gaga’s Paparazzi video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2smz_1L2_0

     

    For more information about William R. Wilkerson, go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wilkerson

     

    Read The Hollywood Reporter at: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com

     

    For more details about Bernini, go to: http://www.bernini.com