‘The Daily Telegraph’s’ expose of yet another rule breaking MP is something to celebrate
The Daily Telegraph is a newspaper that isn’t afraid to expose scandals and that should indeed be celebrated.
Tag: impressive
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Taking a view
The sale of a historic £22 million residence on London’s Cheyne Walk
Cheyne Walk in Chelsea is amongst the addresses that an estate agent would describe as “the most sought after in London”. Up there in the company of the Bishops Avenue, Grosvenor Square and Cadogan Square, it has moved from having been home to artists such as Whistler, Turner and George Eliot to now being where such people as Mick Jagger, Roman Abramovich, Terry Venables and Sally Greene choose to live.
Belle Vue House, 92 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, London, SW10 0DQ Of the houses there, No. 92, known as Belle Vue House is particularly impressive. Built in 1771, this terraced property stands in the original grounds of Beaufort House, the London residence of the Duke of Beaufort. It is currently for sale for £22,000,000.
The building was reputedly designed by Robert Adam and though no reference to this can be found in the collections of his designs at the Soane Museum, it certainly echoes his style. Constructed from stock brick, this Grade II listed house is nearly 50 foot wide and enjoys southward views across the River Thames.
The builder and first owner of Belle Vue House was John Hatchett, an “eminent 18th century coachbuilder”. He planted a mulberry tree in the garden of the house in 1776 that was described by the historian Faulkner as being what he “reckoned one of the finest trees of its kind in England”. It remains to this day. Hatchett let the house to Lady Prime from 1778 to 1797 and in due course the property passed to his son, Charles Hatchett F.R.S. (1765 – 1847), a chemist and “voluminous writer”.
The next resident was the Scottish pre-Raphaelite artist and poet William Bell Scott (1811 – 1890) and his wife, Laetitia. A friend and contemporary of Rosetti, he used the building as a “veritable museum” and lived there between 1871 and 1890.
The Right Honourable The Earl of Beaconsfield KG PC FRS, Benjamin Disraeli (1804 – 1881) lived in Belle Vue House during his second term in office 
The canopy installed by Disraeli that protected Queen Victoria from the elements At various times, other distinguished occupiers have included John Marshall F.R.S. (1818 – 1891), a “distinguished anatomist” and professor of anatomy at the Royal Academy and the British Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli (1804 – 1881). Disraeli lived in the house for two years during his second premiership and is said to have constructed the canopy that links the front door of the house to the road so that Queen Victoria could “visit in privacy and be protected from the weather”.
Sir Rex Harrison (1908 – 1990) and his actress wife Kay Kendall (1927 – 1959) lived in Belle Vue House in 1958 British film actor Sir Rex Harrison (1908 – 1990) lived in Belle Vue House in 1958 with his actress wife Kay Kendall (1927 – 1959). Their short-lived marriage from 1957 to 1959 ended a year later when the Genevieve star died from myeloid leukemia. Terence Rattigan later immortalised their love story in his 1973 play In Praise of Love and in it Harrison played himself.
Ken and Barbara Follett are amongst other famous occupants of the property The politician and army officer Sir Patrick Wall (1916 – 1998) took up residence during the 1960s and he was followed by the author Ken Follett and his politican wife, Barbara. Famous for smartening up the Labour Party during the 1980s with what became known as “Folletting”, the house no doubt made the perfect base for the couple’s political salons. The view of the Thames no doubt also provided Mr Follett with inspiration for several of his best-selling novels.
Visitors to the house pass through a grand entrance hall 
The staircase is especially impressive 
The house features a double drawing room 
The dining room is perfect for grand scale entertaining 
One of a number of other reception rooms The last documented sale of Belle Vue House records that it was sold for £3,000,000 in May 2000. Since then, this house, now limewashed in a most distinctive Tuscan colour, has been sympathetically renovated and includes 8,400 square foot of internal accommodation. Grandly proportioned reception rooms number a first floor double drawing room, dining room, library and sitting room and in addition the house features a large kitchen, breakfast room, study, three bedroom suites, a gym and wine cellars.
In the basement, there is is a large and well equipped kitchen 
In addition, there is a separate breakfast room 
One of three bedroom suites 
A bathroom in Belle Vue House 
The 64′ garden features a mulberry tree from 1776 The rear garden is especially large for the location and measures some 64’2” by 47’7” and in addition there is a three car garage and additional parking.
Whilst the “beautiful view” has clearly changed since Belle Vue House was built, whoever purchases this house will undoubtedly be someone who will add to its remarkable history.
Belle Vue House, 92 Cheyne Walk, London, SW10 0DQ is for sale through Tancred Lidbury of Christie’s International Real Estate. For more information contact him on +44 (0) 20 7389 2478.
View further details at: http://www.christiesrealestate.com/eng/sales/detail/170-l-78252-302918/belle-vue-house-chelsea-london-en-sw3
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Breakfast hawks
A review of Hawksmoor Guildhall, EC2V
In the first of a series, we publish a number of the most popular articles from the blog that conceived The Steeple Times. Here, in a February 2012 piece, Matthew Steeples reviews a boozy breakfast at Hawksmoor Guildhall with Anthony Brown. After seeing an image of their breakfast on Facebook this morning, we were reminded just how good it truly is, so if you haven’t tried it already – you really should.
On arrival at the Hawksmoor Guildhall, in the heart of the City of London, I immediately found myself thinking about Edward Hopper’s iconic painting Nighthawks.
Nighthawks (Art Institute of Chicago, 1942) by Edward Hopper (1882 – 1967) 
The main dining area at Hawksmoor Guildhall
Here, in this vast space, which can seat 160 in the restaurant and 75 in the bar, was a venue that very much combines the feel of an old banking hall with something akin to a friendlier version of the American café diner in Hopper’s Nighthawks painting. Though, to my mind, the City is indeed a lonely place, the welcoming staff and the somewhat noisy suited brokers created an atmosphere that truly reflected the stature of this fine establishment.
My companion and I wrongly assumed that this relatively new restaurant had simply taken the space of something that had been there before. In fact, this was just a clever trick. The owners, Will Beckett and Huw Gott, collaborated with the Macaulay Sinclair design studio, who were also responsible for their Seven Dials site, to create a style that combines solid mahogany panels made out of Natural History Museum specimen cabinets, a bar formed out of the counter of a Dutch bank and teak flooring taken from the University of the Arts Building near Bond Street. The result is truly impressive.
We opted to share the Hawksmoor breakfast for two priced at £35. This superb offering was served in a large pan with a smoked bacon chop, the most phenomenal sausages made from pork, beef and mutton, black pudding, short-rib bubble and squeak, trotter baked beans, fried eggs, grilled mushrooms, roast tomatoes and HP gravy. Served with unlimited toast, not that it was actually required, this bargain of a meal was a breakfast fit for a king. After this, you really won’t need to eat again for several days.
Also on offer for breakfast, on a menu designed by the Hawksmoor’s executive chef, Richard Turner, are wild mushrooms on toast with poached eggs Hollandaise (£10), a 200g fillet steak with fried eggs and hash browns (£25) and a twist on McDonalds in the form of the sausage and egg HkMufin (£8.50). Scotch pancakes come available with streaky bacon and maple syrup (£6) or with roasted plums (£5).
Urged to try the breakfast cocktails, we sampled the Hawksmoor’s Marmalade Cocktail (£8) of gin, lemon juice, homemade orange bitters and a dash of Campari and another named Shaky Pete’s Ginger Brew (£8.50) that consisted of gin, homemade ginger syrup and lemon juice topped with London Pride. The first was sharp and a perfect awakener and the second, described on the menu as “a turbo –shandy for the discerning drinker,” surprisingly worked utterly brilliant in terms of the ingredients it combined.
Open for breakfast from 7am and serving until 10.30pm at night, this is a restaurant of which the Metro’s Marina O’Loughlin rightly comments: “As Homer Simspon might say, mmmnmnhrhmm…”
Hawksmoor Guildhall, 10 Basinghall Street, London, EC2V 5BQ. Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7397 8120. Website: http://thehawksmoor.com/locations/guildhall
Follow Hawksmoor on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/HawksmoorLondon
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Frankel: The Best
The Tout says a fond farewell to Frankel
It must have taken some restraint from Sir Henry Cecil, the trainer of many of the greatest horses of the last 40 years, to wait until after Frankel’s last race on Saturday to state: “Frankel is the best I have trained, the best I have seen and the best horse ever.” Frankel was simply incredible in his final race and gave the huge crowd a real reason to be glad, proud and happy to be at Ascot for his swansong performance.
Frankel and his rider Tom Queally at Ascot on 20th October 2012 
Frankel’s trainer Sir Henry Cecil In hardcore racing terms, Frankel is officially rated by The Jockey Club handicapper as the highest rated of all time but for the memory it was the sheer style of his demolition of other high class horses that will stand out. His pace in the middle of a race was so brutal that before he even switched to top gear from his cruising speed he had dismissed every rival that ever showed up. At one point it was thought that his skills would be restricted to racing over a mile but as has he subsequently showed he was equally efficient and possibly more settled over a mile and a quarter.
The key to his success as he got older was the fact that he settled so much better in his races. The 2000 Guineas was madly impressive and Frankie Dettori was still struggling to believe the way he ran away from the field when he was interviewed a week later and stated that it would normally be impossible to send a horse away from the field at the halfway stage of a classic race. In the role of honour we also have to be grateful to Frankel’s pacemaker, Bullet Train, who did so much to help him in his races by ensuring that the early pace was fast enough.
We salute Frankel and are certain that during our life we will never see his like again. There is now the intrigue of his performance at stud as it seems impossible that he will replicate himself so his first runner in 2016 will be eagerly anticipated and sure to be out of an equally blue blooded mare. Thank goodness he has retired safely from the track and we can all say that we saw Frankel when any other pretenders appear and someone tells you that a certain horse is the best they have seen. Goodbye Frankel, but only for three years. We shall look forward to seeing your progeny appear on the same turf that you bestrode so magnificently.
The Tout.