Tag: Monaco

Extravagance Knows No Bounds – £36m Mansion Previously Owned By Disgraced Tycoons Alan Bond And Conrad Black Again For Sale

Matthew Steeples takes a look at a £36 million Kensington mansion formerly owned by disgraced business tycoons Alan Bond and Lord Black; its former chatelaine was known for stating “I have an extravagance that know no bounds”

Sir Winston Churchill’s daughter Mary Soames once described the buccaneering businessman and media tycoon Lord Black of Crossharbour as “London’s biggest bore unhung” whilst his wife, Lady Black – better known as the author and journalist Barbara Amiel – was suggested to be just a “rich bitch” by Sarah Sands in a “case for the defence” article in the Independent in October 2006.

“Poster boy for the 80s” turned fraudster and jailbird Alan Bond (1938 – 2015) was an English-Australian businessman equally Marmite-like in being liked or loathed and now a Kensington mansion owned for a time by both subsequently disgraced businessmen is once again for sale.

14 Cottesmore Gardens, formerly known as 12 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens, was purchased by Alan Bond’s Satellite Group for £7 million in the 1980s and sold by administrators of that business to Conrad Black and his wife for the knockdown sum of just £3.5 million in 1992.

Plain old Mr and Mrs Black (as they then were) lavished further millions – some of which came from the company Hollinger International, Inc., which ultimately resulted in their downfall – on the double fronted 19^th century mansion and used it for entertaining on a lavish scale. Guests, including the likes of Prince and Princess Michael of Kent, Joan Collins, Margaret Thatcher, Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Goldsmith, James Hanson, Arnold Weinstock, Jacob Rothschild, Peter Mandelson and Tony Blair, were said to flock to the parties they gave there, but in 2005 these gatherings of upto 400 people at a time came to an almighty end.

Forced to sell at a bargain basement price of just £13.1 million on an ask of £17.5 million as the Canadian born billionaire faced jail time in America, Lord and Lady Black’s tenure was over and the residence saw its “arriviste torch” passed to Juan and Adriana Villalonga, a couple described as “a Mexican telecom czar and his beauty-queen wife.” Of what came next, The Globe And Mail’s Paul Waldie pointedly penned in February 2007: “[They] quickly erased many of the features that the Blacks prized.”

Once again for sale as of April 2023, the value of 14 Cottesmore Gardens has again been deemed to have substantially risen. Knight Frank offer the 12,310 square foot, five-storey residence at a punchy price of £36 million and laud it as “imposing” and “presented in good order throughout.” They add that a “pre-planning consultation” has found that further accommodation could be added that would take the internal space to more than 15,000 square feet; business barons with deep pockets only need apply.

Editor’s Note – Unlike as is the case in many publications, this article was NOT sponsored or supported by a third-party. Follow Matthew Steeples on Twitter at @M_Steeples.

Pictured Top – 54-foot wide 14 Cottesmore Gardens is described by selling agents Knight Frank as “offering lateral living so often requested but so hard to find in central London.” They neglect to mention that with its hedges cut back to the minimum, the place actually looks extremely forlorn.

Flamboyant Lord and Lady Black dressed as Cardinal Richelieu and Marie Antoinette for a party at Kensington Palace in 2000. For a time, the couple employed 17 butlers (if Tom Bower is to be believed) and had two private jets and homes – aside from the 19th Cottesmore Gardens mansion – in New York, Palm Beach and Toronto. “Guests packed into their parties at Cottesmore Gardens,” Bower remarked in his 2006 book the couple, adding: “Amiel was a big spender… Under the control of senior butler Andrew Lightwood, second butler Peter Wilson and a succession of third butlers, Amiel’s life in Kensington had become what her constantly changing staff called ‘bizarre.’ Each recruit was taken by Lightwood on an introductory tour of the house, ending on the roof. ‘Make sure the landing lights are on at all times,’ instructed Lightwood solemnly, ‘because Madame takes off from here on her broomstick looking for cats. She needs the lights to guide her return.’ His face would crack into a smile. ‘Most important, take care that she never sees you. She hates seeing any of us.’ Amiel’s eccentricity demanded that her staff hid whenever she approached, diving into cupboards if necessary, and never entered her quarters when she was present. Every day, all the bed linen was changed and subjected to ‘the penny test.’ A coin was dropped onto the sheets. If it failed to bounce they were not drawn sufficiently tight. Every cushion was arranged to a precise pre-ordained position, and each towel placed exactly as Amiel had predetermined. ‘Andrew!’ she screamed down the telephone on one memorable occasion, ‘the towels are in the wrong place!’ Lightwood, as Amiel knew, was in New York, but he was expected to telephone the staff in the house in London to rectify the error. ‘You f**king pillock!’ she yelled at another member of staff for reading her ‘Daily Mail’ before it was delivered to her.”

Barbara Amiel Black (or ‘Lady Black’ as she prefers to be known) in her drawing room at Cottesmore Gardens (pictured). Of her, Sarah Sands on Lord and Lady Black in the ‘Independent’ in October 2006 opined: “Conrad and Barbara in their monstrous, glamorous way, knew how to throw parties. The talk was of geo-politics and hemlines. Nowadays, we scorn their extravagance and doubt the source of their wealth with prune-faced hindsight. Meanwhile, everyone is sucking up to Russians…. Barbara would disingenuously begin her midnight calls to me by saying in her low, breathy voice: ‘I hope I am not disturbing you.’ She would then offer little glimpses of her own home life. I remember her mentioning that Conrad Black was upstairs playing with his fleet of toy gun ships in the bath… I remember her examining an exhibition of doll’s houses at the Chelsea Flower Show and sighing how restful it would be to live in this cosy little home. How she envied people in small houses. The burden of wealth was one of her more dangerous fantasies. At one of her Gatsby-style parties in Kensington, she flinched at the elaborate canapés on offer: ‘Really, all I want is a sausage,’ she said, piteously. Then, she ran a hand down her inconceivably expensive dress and whispered: ‘I hate these parties, I am so shy.’ Later, I was invited to her boudoir, where she lay on cushion surrounded by her women friends. She was Kensington’s Cleopatra, surrounded by maidens such as the designer and Forte daughter Olga Polizzi, the political thinker Tessa Keswick and the writer Miriam Gross.”

The very same drawing room at 14 Cottesmore Gardens today. The décor is now somewhat more modern and less ‘classical country house-ified.’ It’s certainly more Soho Farmhouse than Alberto Pinto in style; it is currently a space that the former Meghan Markle would feel more at home than say, perhaps, the likes of Lord and Lady Black’s chum Ghislaine Maxwell and her fellow noxious nonce Ponzi scheming paedophile boyfriend Jeffrey Epstein. Mr Pinto was responsible, it should be noted, for the designs of most of Epstein’s residences.

The front elevation of 12 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens during the era it was owned by Lord and Lady Black.

Multiple entries for Lord and Lady Black during the time they owned 14 Cottesmore Gardens appeared in the ‘Little Black Book’ address book often attributed as being that of the friends and associates of Jeffrey Epstein, but that featured more of the contacts of Ghislaine Maxwell in fact. In October 2020, Barbara Amiel took revenge on the pension pot plunderer’s padeophile sex trafficker daughter by featuring her in her “score-settling” memoir ‘Friends & Enemies: A Life in Vogue, Prison, & Park Avenue.” Maxwell had “dumped” Lady Black when Lord Black was being investigated for fraud. She wrote of their last meeting: “We were friends – so putting on my ‘So good to see you’ face, I headed for her. She bolted. Turned that sharp tight little turn when you really want to get away. And that was it.”

Of the clear lover of plastic surgery Lady Black, in October 2020, Sarah Sands remarked in ‘The Mail on Sunday’: “She had a bohemian, almost masculine, view of opportunistic sex. She describes, for instance, accompanying an early love in his white Triumph sports car ‘in which once or twice I had performed fellatio to the fascination of passing truck drivers, all for fun.’”

After getting out of the clink in 2012, Lord and Lady Black decided to go back on the ‘razzle-dazzle’ and posed for photographers before heading back to London to party with friends. In May 2019, the rambunctious peer arrogantly announced he’d be returning to the House of Lords after President Donald Trump pardoned and praised him. Commenting, of this pardon, Lord Black declared: “I’m not bitter… Officially in the United States, I’ve never been charged and I won in the end. It was a war and there are casualties in wars. I lost the time, I lost a lot of money, but as you can see my standards of living isn’t bad… The truth is, these, last 15 years, I haven’t been as interested in British politics as I was before – in the Thatcher years. It could be quite interesting again, in fact it is as of right now – it’s very interesting… It’s my good fortune that at a time when it is feasible, it happens – by happy coincidence – that it is a time of great fermentation in British public affairs.” Surprisingly, he doesn’t seem to have turned up on occasions since.

The previous owner of 14 Cottesmore Gardens, Alan Bond (1938 – 2015), will forever be remembered as “Australia’s most notorious corporate criminal.” Born in Hammersmith, London, Bond’s first crime occurred when he was charged with theft aged 14 in Fremantle in Australia and whilst he is remembered for bankrolling the successful challenge for the 1983 America’s Cup, it is for causing the then biggest corporate collapse in Australian history that he will be go down in history.

Former Miss Mexico Adriana Abascal López-Cisneros (at the time Adriana Villalonga) bought the house in 2005. She divorced the Spanish businessman Juan Villalonga in 2009 and married the French businessman Emmanuel Schreder in Ibiza in June 2013. In August 2014, the magazine ‘Quién’ featured the model and television presenter on its cover and at that time she described her new husband as “the love of my life.”

Madrid born Juan Villalonga became the joint owner of 14 Cottesmore Gardens with his then wife Adriana Abascal – the couple were married between 2000 and 2009 – in 2005. He is listed on Companies House as being a director of the now dissolved Medikidz Foundation at the address between August 2009 and November 2013. Married since 2011 to a photographer named Vanessa Von Zitewitz, Mr Villalonga was a partner at McKinsey & Company in the 1980s, CEO for Credit Suisse First Boston and Bankers Trust in Spain in the early 1990s and CEO of Telefónica from 1996 to 2000. He was named as one of the best performing chief executive officers in the world by ‘Harvard Business Review’ in 2010 and is also linked to addresses in Monaco.

The Names & Numbers – 14 Cottesmore Gardens (formerly known as ’12 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens’), Kensington, London, W8 5PR, United Kingdom

April 2023 – Offered for sale for £36 million ($44.4 million, €40.9 million or درهم163.2 million) through Knight Frank. Valued on Homipi at an upper sum of £28.558 million ($35.250 million, €32.440 million or درهم129.456 million).

2009 – Mr and Mrs Villalonga divorce and subsequently Adriana Abascal married Emmanuel Schreder, a French businessman, in Ibiza in June 2013.

2005 – Sold by Lord and Lady Black for £13.1 million ($16.2 million, €14.9 million or درهم59.4 million) to Spanish businessman Juan Villalonga Navarro and Mexican model, Miss Mexico winner and television presenter Adriana Abascal López-Cisneros Villalonga.

October 2004 – Placed for sale for £17.5 million ($21.6 million, €19.9 million or درهم79.3 million) according to NZ Herald.

January 2004 – Valued at £14 million ($17.3 million, €15.9 million or درهم63.5 million) according to The Globe And Mail. At the time, the “mansion” in “the upscale Kensington neighbourhood” was described as having “10 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms and a swimming pool.”

Featured also in The Guardian in an article by Chris Tryhorn. Quoting Lord Black, he shared: “At a certain price, anything is for sale. [It has] been shown to people in the not-too-distant-past.”

Going further, Tryhorn added: “Artwork from the 18^th and 19^th centuries lines the walls, and there is plenty of storage space for the extensive wardrobe and shoe collection of Lord Black’s wife, Barbara Amiel, who famously declared once that her ‘extravagence knows no bounds.’ … It was originally two homes and one of the two original front doors is now a ‘deliveries’ entrance. He has used it in the past to host dinners with butler and maid service that was part-paid by Hollinger.”

Also in 2004, in a profile in The Spectator, Peter Oborne wrote:

“Every year the Blacks threw two parties, one at Christmas and one summer event, at their double-fronted 11-bedroom mansion in Cottesmore Gardens. Everybody who mattered at the time went: Margaret Thatcher, Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Goldsmith, James Hanson, Arnold Weinstock, Jacob Rothschild, royalty, the playwright Tom Stoppard.”

“Some of these, injudiciously as it turned out, agreed to join the main Hollinger board. The luckier ones – Peter Carrington, Robert Salisbury – got away with being made directors of The Telegraph. As the Tories faded out, Labour ministers started to arrive, the indefatigable Peter Mandelson, David Blunkett and other ministers eager to ingratiate themselves with the Tory press. Prince and Princess Michael of Kent were assiduous in attendance. In London, the Nineties belonged to the Blacks. They were London’s most glamorous power couple.”

“There had been a time when both Blacks had kept their feet on the ground. This ceased to be the case. One evening Barbara Black rang Charles Moore panic-stricken from her Kensington home. There had been a last-minute drop-out from one of the famous Black dinner parties. ‘I’m short of a woman,’ she told Moore. Moore surveyed the newsroom. His gaze alighted on the journalist Eleanor Mills, by chance the stepdaughter of the Cabinet minister Tessa Jowell.”

“An hour later, hastily groomed, made-up and brushed, Mills was sipping pre-dinner drinks in Cottesmore Gardens. Then disaster struck. A male guest, Max Fisher, dropped out. Mills was approached by Conrad Black. ‘Finish your drink and skedaddle,’ he told her. Barbara Black then told her to go to the kitchen and out through the servants’ door, where the driver would pick her up and take her home.”

2001 – Conrad Black is elevated to a life peerage in the United Kingdom at the suggestion of Tony Blair. He sat on the Conservative benches in the House of Lords until 2007 as The Right Honourable The Lord Black of Crossharbour KCSG, but took a “leave of absence” between 2012 and 2019.

28^th May 1996 – The Royal Borough of Kensington And Chelsea ordered that 12 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens “shall be known and described” simply instead as 14 Cottesmore Gardens.

Mid 1990s – The Blacks set about renovating 12 and 14 Cottesmore Gardens with the help of J. E. Evans Associates. Of the work in October 2006, The Sunday Times shared a segment of Tom Bower’s 2006 hatchet job Conrad and Lady Black that read: “Amiel vowed to create a palace that would attract celebrity worshipers of a power couple. Part of the first floor was to be removed to create a huge ground floor reception area.”

1992 – 12 and 14 Cottesmore Gardens sold by the administrators of the affairs of Alan Bond through estate agents Savills to media tycoon Conrad Black and his Watford born journalist wife Barbara Amiel Black for “well under the asking price” for a sum of £3.5 million ($4.3 million, €4 million or درهم15.9 million).

Mr Bond had been granted mortgages valued at £16.2 million ($20 million, €18.4 million or درهم73.5 million) on the property by Bell Satellite Services on the property along with two others at 4 and 16 Belgrave Mews in London, SW1 previously according to a report published by Financial Review in March 1990.

1991 – Rented to an American businessman for £6,000 per week ($7,400, €6,800 or درهم27,200 per week).

1990 – Placed in the hands of administrators of Mr Bond’s and placed for sale through Savills for a bargain basement sum of £3.8 million ($4.7 million, €4.3 million or درهم17.2 million) according to Financial Review.

1980s – Sold to Alan Bond’s Bell Satellite Group for £7 million ($8.6 million, €8 million or درهم31.7 million).

Circa 1905 – Walter Tapper is said to have “designed a library with handsome Arts and Crafts plasterwork (now removed) at the rear of the building.”

1903 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens registered as the home of a Mrs Benson according to the Muster Roll of Angus: South African War, 1899 – 1902.

1869 – In their current marketing blurb, Knight Frank suggest: “There has been a house on the site of 12 – 14 Cottesmore Gardens since at least 1869. The current house has been altered, extended and most notably joined over the subsequent century and a half. With the local planning department strongly opposed to further amalgamation of homes, opportunities to acquire a house of this width will be rarer still in the future.”

1850s to 1860s – Built “under the direction of David Howell, of Serjeants Inn, Fleet Street.” Mr Howell was described in 1853 as an “articled clerk to a solicitor, lately carrying on business as a solicitor.” The architecture was lauded as: “Designed in a bold classical manner, with rather fleshy consoles and modillions… and bands of Vitruvian scroll between the bases of the ground-floor windows.”

More photographs of the £36 million mansion…

An entrance hall where power and privilege have most certainly mingled previously.

The 54-foot wide drawing is lauded by selling realtors Knight Frank as “arguably the best room in the house” and “double aspect.” They add: “[It has] six windows overlooking the street and additional views over the private garden to the rear.”

The columns where Barbara Amiel Black once posed for photographs remain, but the subsequent owners eliminated much of the 1990s ‘brash’ that had been installed by a Watford born woman whose excess clearly offended so many.

This dining room, where Conrad Black hosted presidents and prime ministers, is now somewhat diminished. The table for eight looks completely out of place and a future owner would do well to install something a little grander.

A double height entertaining space was installed at the insistence of the loftier-than-lofty Lady Black in the 1990s and it remains today. However, it is now currently being used for more casual affairs such as Netflix viewing rather than being the scene of something that you’d more likely find in the ‘House of Cards’ in fact.

A new owner might reinstate the grandeur of the past; sadly, however, this seems unlikely and the purchaser is more likely to be a footballer or Internet tycoon than a super-connected business tycoon.

This currently very dark and very depressing study would most certainly not appeal to the very clearly very, very bright yet very, very pompous The Right Honourable The Lord Black of Crossharbour KCSG – a man who is said to count Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte as “his military heroes.” Of him in July 1997, Mark Honigsbaum in the ‘Independent’ remarked: “Although Black’s grandfather had briefly been a business partner of Harold Harmsworth, the original Viscount Rothermere, it was from his father, George Montegu Black Jr, that Black learned the art of corporate warfare, the importance of historical perspective and that gambling provides a disappointing rate of return compared to the Dow Jones index… The young Conrad was precocious. At the age of eight he sank his life savings of $60 into a single share of General Motors. He also became obsessed with Napoleon, and would astound his father’s friends by reeling off details of campaigns. Another story has him washing dollar bills and hanging them out to dry on a line outside his father’s home in Toronto. The last is apocryphal – Black says he slipped in the mud and was cleaning his change – but the image of the young capitalist, wise beyond his years, is accurate. His childhood tutor, the historian Laurier LaPierre, once asked Black why he always seemed to have the air of someone waiting for something to happen… A few years ago, for instance, the rumour went round Fleet Street that Black had bought Napoleon’s preserved penis at an auction. Black denied it, but many remain convinced that Bonaparte’s body part sits in Black’s collection of military curios… Black is no philanderer and is devoted to his second wife, the former ‘Sunday Times’ columnist Barbara Amiel. They are said to be intellectual soul mates and the parties at their four-storey mansion in Kensington are famous for bringing together a cross-section of the great and good.”

One could not imagine the likes of the late great Baroness Thatcher, for example, liking the idea of sitting in this extremely depressing and dark waiting area. A new owner would do well to obliterate a décor scheme that could have only been favoured by a completely colour blind banker.

A room currently described as a ‘cinema room’ measures 28’6” by 21’6” and is situated at the rear of the house. One can imagine Conrad Black having sat here for hour upon hour watching historical dramas about Napoleon with the likes of chums such as the acclaimed historian Andrew Roberts, the gambling tycoon John Aspinall and the politician and diarist Alan Clark, but a new owner will be more likely next showing episodes of ‘Succession’ – based on ‘The Telegraph’ tycoon’s rival Rupert Murdoch – than viewing historical works one most definitely suspects.

Dining whilst the staff cook would NEVER have been on the agenda in the era that pomposity reigned whilst Lady Black was chatelaine of 14 Cottesmore Gardens.

A 2,000 square foot entire floor fit for a tycoon… The master bedroom suite of the house takes up the entirety of the second floor of the building. It incorporates not only the principal bedroom, but also a “his” dressing room and a “her” dressing room as well as a sitting area, a bathroom, a shower room and storage rooms. It has direct lift access and is bigger than the average Brit’s entire house.

A dressing room in the house where Barbara Black opened up to ‘Vogue’ and displayed “closets overflowing with dazzling evening gowns, designer handbags and 100 pairs of Manolo Blahnik shoes. ‘I have an extravagance that knows no bounds,’ she famously declared. Unfortunately for Lady Black, the article was closely perused at investment company Tweedy, Browne, a Hollinger International shareholder.”

This playroom certainly did not exist in the era that Lord and Lady Black owned the property. It would be more likely crammed with books or stuffed with Manolo Blahnik shoes than toys from Toys ‘R Us. A new owner may likely reinstate it as an additional bedroom or office or games room perhaps.

The pool room measures 43’9” by 26’9” and is no doubt where Lady Black spent many an hour relaxing.

The garden to the rear was where Lord and Lady Black hosted their annual summer party (with guests “spilling” into their drawing room also). In surprisingly Tardis-like fashion, the duo were able to supposedly squeeze in upto 400 guests at such occasions. Amongst those said to have enjoyed hospitality there were Joan Collins and of such, magazine publisher Nicholas Coleridge wrote: “If you get a kick out of milling about with present and former prime ministers, cabinet ministers, minor royals, dukes, editors, vastly rich Americans, distinguished historians, gossip columnists, playboys and lots of pretty ‘it’ girls, then this was the place to be.”

The existing floor plan of the property illustrates the vast scale of the building offered. A buyer, Knight Frank observe, has additional options and “a pre-planning consultation has been carried out with RBKC by leading architects Studio Indigo.” They add: “[It] would completely reconfigure the house adding an additional basement floor and taking the internal space to more than 15,000 square foot. The resulting house would have a 40-foot by 41-foot south-facing rear garden.”

A plan of the site as presented in 1996 when 12 and 14 became known just as 14 Cottesmore Gardens.

April 2, 2023
A Boat For Brenda

As decidedly dippy Dame Esther Rantzen calls for tyrannical twerp Sir Philip Green to hand over his behemoth boat to the Queen, we suggest Sir James Dyson or Sir Charles Dunstone’s gin palaces as other options that could be commandeered

This morning on Radio 4’s Broadcasting House, Dame Esther Rantzen, for once in her somewhat curious career, made a valid suggestion when discussing the current hullabaloo over whether or not the nation should spend £200 million on a new royal yacht.

Commenting to the programme’s Paddy O’Connell of a “pomp and ceremony” focused proposal that the Conservatives are plainly using to wind up Labour, Dame Esther remarked:

“This is to me a crazy idea at a time when our economy has been obviously dealt something of a death blow by COVID, when we have no plans for social care, when food banks are thriving. Do we really think that the taxpayer, let alone the royal family, want £200 million spent on a royal yacht?”

“I think it’s an example of a newspaper starting a campaign which is so out of touch. However, perhaps, I have the solution: Sir Philip Green, do you remember him? He has a knighthood – which some people have questioned. He lives in Monaco, where there’s plenty of other people with yachts. Why doesn’t he donate his boat to the royal family?”

“If he’s got monograms with the words ‘Philip’ on it, that would be suitable for those who feel that the yacht should be named after Philip, Duke of Edinburgh… Prince Philip, you could just add a few, a few, you know…”

Equally, given the late NCP car park tycoon Sir Donald Gosling left £50 million in his will towards a replacement for the Royal Yacht Britannia, we suggest some potentially cheaper boating options to Sir Philip Green’s £100 million gin palace below that could also be commandeered.

Pictured top: The late Sir Donald Gosling’s former yacht Leander and its owner with the Queen and her late husband in 2012.

Option 1 – Sir Philip Green’s ‘Lionheart’

Pros – The disgraced businessman’s gin palace is definitely big at 295-foot and can accommodate 12 guests with a crew of 30. It’d probably also appeal to ‘Randy Andy’ given his liking for living it large and there is plenty of space on the boat’s deck for the ‘Duchess of Dork’ to engage in a bit of toe sucking as well.

Cons – This boat’s décor would likely be considered a bit ‘lowbrow’ by the Queen given “Call Me Lady Tina” – the rotten retailer’s wife – is known more for brass than class. The tacky tub might need a bit of a clean also as in September 2020, the vessel was impounded in Monaco due to two of its staff contracting coronavirus.

Option 2 – Sir James Dyson’s ‘Nahlin’

Pros – Given all the breaks billionaire Sir James Dyson and his carpet designer wife ‘Lady Deirdre’ have been given by Boris Johnson in spite of disgracefully relocating their operations abroad, you’d think they might want to give something back and hand over their boat.

As was reported in the Guardian yesterday, this steam yacht has also been subject to a £25 million restoration and has ‘previous royal form’ in that it housed the then King Edward VIII and Mrs Wallis Simpson just prior to the 1936 abdication crisis. Perhaps that might attract that devious duo’s modern day equivalents, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, onboard for peace talks.

Cons – The Queen could find herself like the majority of the population, who’ve wasted money on his frankly mostly useless products, a little frustrated with the vessel’s hypocritical Brexiteer owner and we don’t think she’d like ‘Dreary Deirdre’s’ appalling rug designs either.

Option 3 – Sir Charles Dunstone’s ‘Shemara’

Pros – The 210-foot motor yacht Shemara is a favourite of all at The Steeple Times. Built by Sir Bernard Docker at the behest of his brilliantly batty wife, ‘Lady Nora,’ in 1938, this vessel has played host to everyone from King Farouk of Egypt to coalminers.

Cons – If the Queen took over this boat, she might find herself a little beholden to the ‘Chipping Norton set’ given Sir Charles Dunstone is considered one of that group’s most illustrious members. Conversations with Rebekah Brooks about her thoughts on her wayward grandchild and his money grabbing wife might not prove easy, but Jeremy Clarkson could break the ice with a drink or five.

May 16, 2021
The Spectre Shooting Brake

2015 Rolls-Royce Wraith converted to a ‘Spectre’ shooting brake by automotive genius Niels van Roij for sale for 157% more than it originally cost

A modern day ‘shooting brake’ is effectively just a “sexier” ‘estate car’ if you’d believe Car Wow, but an adapted one-off Rolls-Royce Wraith version that is to be auctioned later this month with an upper estimate of nearly £500,000 is definitely more than appealing.

Named in honour of the 2015 James Bond film Spectre, the big-booted two-seater to be offered by Bonhams is the creation of the Niels van Roij Design studio – whose £256,000 coachbuilt 2018 Range Rover ‘Adventum Coupé’ we featured in March 2020.

Based on a Rolls-Royce Wraith produced in mid-2015 and first registered in the UK in January 2016, the original car – which had around 11,100 miles on the clock – was last serviced in 2018 and then subjected to an 18-month £260,000 conversion that makes it “one of the costliest cars ever made.”

Driven just 125 miles in the time since, the vehicle is described as being “in excellent condition throughout” and because of the coronavirus pandemic has not been exhibited publicly until now.

Of it, its creator, who worked with Belgian firm Carat Duchatelet to build it, remarked: “The elongated lines signal masterful craftsmanship and exquisite style. A manifestation of Grand Touring in its purest form.”

In a series of videos shared on YouTube in October 2020, Niels van Roij remarked:

“The car has been named after the image of a shadow, a ghost, a spirit if you’d like and has been styled by Niels van Roij Design… As you can see, the car has been styled with a certain sense of drama that harks back to the heydays of shooting brakes in the 1930s.”

“We’ve also overseen the construction process, as we do with all our coachbuilt cars… The outcome is an original design and also historically relevant… The new bodywork allows for very different proportions [that are]… very sculptural.”

“The Silver Spectre shooting brake is strictly limited to only seven examples [since changed to just one] worldwide and it is available with the largest starlight headliner boasting a world’s first celestial infinity nightscape.”

“The Silver Spectre has also been equipped with an increased power output giving a total of 700 horsepower.”

‘The Spectre Shooting Brake’ will be auctioned by Bonhams at their ‘Les Grandes Marques à Monaco’ sale in Monte Carlo on 23^rd April.

The Numbers – The Spectre Shooting Brake

23^rd April 2021 – Offered at auction by Bonhams in Monaco with an estimate of £320,000 to £480,000 ($440,000 to $660,000, €370,000 to €550,000 or درهم1.6 million to درهم2.4 million).

2018 – 2020 – Cost of conversion estimated to be £260,000 ($360,000, €300,000 or درهم1.3 million) giving a total cost for the creation of circa £448,000 ($618,000, €515,750 or درهم2.3 million).

Base price in 2013 for the original mid-2015 car – £187,000 ($258,000, €215,750 or درهم949,000).

Aside from having ‘suicide doors,’ the shooting brake has a lavishly appointed interior that features highly polished woods and colour matched leather.

The boot is large enough to accommodate shotguns, golf clubs or simply a picnic even.

A unique picnic hamper trunk comes with the vehicle.

The car also features plates from Niels van Roij Design’s studio.

Here is a one of one shooting brake that nobody else will ever own. It has been subjected to an increase in power and torque output of the 6.6 liter twin-turbo V12 engine. The standard 632 hp and 800 Nm (or max 870 Nm of torque for Black Badge) has been increased to 700 hp and 900 Nm.

In this video, shared on YouTube, Niels van Roij explains what inspired him to create the car. Going further, on his own website, he added: “We envisioned a daring, three-box rather than two-box shooting brake aesthetic and with that a convention-challenging design. The car features very English proportions inside and out, and uncompromised levels of luxury.”

April 15, 2021
Petitioning Sir Shifty

Change.org petition seeking to have ‘Sir Shifty’ Philip Green stripped of his knighthood soars to 190,000 supporters in just 48 hours

We’ve seen the power of Change.org ourselves and with our petition seeking to ban the bear slaying barbarian bitch Larysa Switlyk from Instagram now at nearly 13,300 signatures, we hope that social media outlet will soon pay attention and send her to silence in Siberia.

Another petition on the site, created two days ago by someone named Sophia Mepham, that was actually first brought to our attention by a former social associate of ‘Sir Shifty’ Philip Green, however, has rocketed to 190,000 signatures in just hours.

The campaign to “Strip Sir Philip Green of his knighthood” is one we urge readers to sign by clicking here. It is accompanied by the following missive:

Sir Philip Green’s net worth is £930m according to the Sunday Times rich list, although other reports say it’s even higher. His retail empire has just collapsed, taking along with it employees financial stability and part of their hard earned pensions.

Sir Phillip Green is a British businessman, whose wife is the owner of the investment group Taveta Investments. This said investment group owns the retail company ‘Arcadia Group’ for which Green is Chairman. It is made up of fashion brands such as Topshop and Dorothy Perkins, in total eight high street retailers.

Sir Philip Green was made a Knight Bachelor in the 2006 Queen’s Birthday Honours “For services to the Retail Industry”.

Now, it is 2020 and for a number of years the Arcadia Group has continued to spiral in to financial turmoil, ending in the Arcadia Group going in to administration on 30th November 2020. Putting 13,000 jobs at risk, along with over 10,000 of the employees pensions pots at risk of being cut.

This said pension pot has an estimated deficit of £350m, which at the time of writing both the industry and MP’s have called on Green to plug the shortfall, whilst he sits on his £100m yacht, in Monaco (the tax haven he lives in with his wife, not to be confused with where Taveta Investments is registered – in another tax haven, Jersey).

Sir Philip Green has mis-managed the Arcadia Group by not providing the resources it requires (both financial or otherwise) to stop the company going in to the brink of financial ruin for years. He is responsible for putting peoples livelihoods in jeopardy.

Adding to it now, the uncertainty around him plugging the deficit of the pension pots. Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said he ‘stands ready’ to help the employees at risk of job losses at Arcadia. However, when a man has become so incredibly wealthy from a retail empire, (allegedly avoiding tax), he should not be seeking help from the official lifeboat scheme – the Pension Protection Fund or the government to use taxpayers money to fund the deficit.

Other holders of a knighthood that have been revoked include, Fred Goodwin who is the former RBS boss. He was knighted in 2004 for ‘Services to the Banking Industry’ but his title was revoked because he let the bank to the brink of collapse in 2008. The Cabinet Office based their decision on the fact that the catastrophe required a £45billion bailout from the taxpayer.

Green does not deserve a knighthood ‘For Services to the Retail Industry’, the only service this man has provided is to help Arcadia Group’s 13,000 employees have an uncertain future. He too, much like Fred Goodwin, has left the Arcadia Group, which is owned by his company Taveta Investments on the brink of collapse.

To get a knighthood stripped we need to get the Forfeiture Committee to consider the honour be removed. The Committee’s recommendations for forfeiture are submitted through the Prime Minister to the Queen, who will then approve it.

By signing this petition, we can get this issue in the laps of the Forfeiture Committee and strip Sir Philip Green of his knighthood.

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Shameless and Shocking – Whilst 13,000 employees of Arcadia Group face Christmas and beyond in penury, tubby turd Sir Philip Green and his title-obsessed wife Tina continue to live-it-up on their 295-foot long yacht, Lionheart. The petition to strip this grubby duo of their titles deserves everyone’s support.

December 4, 2020
Greedy Green Goes Red

As ‘The Sun’ quite rightly rebrands Tina Green ‘Lady Greed,’ we join those demanding this creep cough up before Christmas; why should 13,000 families suffer whilst she sits smugly on a £100m yacht?

Luxury loving Lady Green – who is known to pompously demand those she regards as serfs call her ‘Lady Tina’ – got herself a new moniker in the red-topped The Sun this morning.

Deservedly rebranded ‘Lady Greed’ today, this twice married mother of four and all-round disgrace of a woman is actually worse than her hideous hulk of a husband, ‘Sir Shifty.’ She actually controls the purse strings of the now collapsed Arcadia Group as her very own company owns 92% of it and now it’s in the red, it is time this cash-tin-collecting cretin accepted some personal responsibility.

As 13,000 poor employees and their families face Christmas and beyond in penury due to the mismanagement of ‘Tacky Tina’ and her husband, now is the time when this wicked wench could finally do the decent thing: Lady Green should sell one of her £100 million yachts and pull off a publicity coup by paying off those that her business failings will otherwise make suffer.

Pictured top: The grubby Greens love living it up, quaffing champagne and used to often be found lauding it over the plebs in Annabel’s. These “modern day Dockers” should now become social pariahs.

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Grubby Green Goes Red – Tina Green supposedly cares about her title and status more than anything else. She ought to have been stripped of it after the BHS pensions debacle whilst her fame seeking criminal shagging daughter, Chloe, should jolly well fade into obscurity also.

December 1, 2020
Sir Shifty Returns to Zero

As Arcadia looks set to go under today, ‘Sir Shifty’ Philip Green will deservedly become this season’s pantomime villain

This morning in the Guardian, a “veteran retail analyst” named Richard Hyman declared of ‘Sir Shifty’ Philip Green: “He’s gone from zero to hero, and now it looks like he’s going back to zero again.”

Sadly, why that outcome would be very much deserved for a man the legendary actor-writer-producer Steven Berkoff termed “a cross between Shylock and Al Capone” in this very publication, on the day that his retail empire likely goes under, this rotten rat and his sleazy scumbag family will retain their £100 million yacht just as 13,000 people will likely lose their jobs.

Whilst Sir Philip turned down his arch rival Mike Ashley’s offer of a “£50 million lifeline” to keep Arcadia out of administration – with a spokesman for the fat fool telling The Sun on Saturday: “It’s laughable… Sir Philip is not keen to jump into bed with a chancer” – it is now once again time to remind our government of what should really come next.

As the video below proves, Sir Philip Green is not a man of good personal character and in addition he is also not a businessman of sterling quality. This brash braggart and his tax avoiding wench of a wife should be stripped of their ill-gotten titles and they should now finally be told to bog off to super yachting Siberia. Forever.

Pictured top: Sir Philip Green once thought it funny to wander around in a T-shirt emblazoned with: “Phil Says Relax.” He must now be condemned for causing the Christmases of 13,000 families to be anything but relaxed. Shame on him.

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Sir Shifty Returns to Zero – Looking as if he didn’t care in the world and wearing scummy white socks, beached whale Sir Philip Green sprawled his colossal belly out on the deck of his £100 million super yacht. According to ‘The Sun,’ the shameless tycoon supposedly will Christmas with a £30,000 per night getaway whilst “13,000 of his staff face the sack.”

Sir Shifty Returns to Zero – “Shylock crossed with Al Capone-esque” Sir Philip Green, his title obsessed wife Tina and well-known village bike of a daughter, Chloe.

Sir Shifty Returns to Zero – A bit like bum slapping, sex offending ex-Tory MP Charlie Elphicke, rotten rat Sir Philip Green likes a bit of a grope and fondle whilst shouting: “I’ve got Naughty.”

November 30, 2020
Mocking The Dockers
Welsh ‘mock castle’ once occupied by notorious spendaholic Lady Docker for sale for £2.85m; the Dockers were turfed out in 1956 after it was discovered they’d lavished the equivalent of £1.3m today of company money on the place without permission
- Alleged inspiration for ‘The Pink Panther’ film, Norah Docker (AKA ‘Naughty Norah’ and ‘Lady Muck’) described herself as “an artificial blonde, among thousands of artificial blondes searching for stardom.”
- Of her second husband, Sir William Collins, chairman of Fortnum & Mason, she announced: “He was 69, I married him for his money.”
- Lady Docker used her third husband Sir Bernard Docker’s company money to create Daimler cars upholstered in zebra hide – “because mink is too hot to sit on.”
- The couple also plundered the company to buy Glandyfi Castle in Wales and spent an equivalent of £1.3 million of today’s money on it.
- The Grade II listed, early 19^th century ‘mock castle’ became a small hotel and is currently for sale for £2.85 million.
The best known ‘occupants’ of Glandyfi Castle, an early 19^th century ‘mock castle’ eleven miles from Aberystwyth in Mid Wales, were Birmingham Small Arms Company (BSA) managing director and Daimler chairman Sir Bernard Docker and his notoriously decadent wife, ‘Naughty Norah.’

The Dockers, a “spendaholic” pair said to be the inspiration for the 1963 film The Pink Panther, lavished the equivalent of £1.3 million of today’s money buying and altering the castle in 1949 – the very same year they were robbed of £1.9 million of diamonds in today’s money at their Mayfair home also.

Sir Bernard and Lady Docker lived at Glandyfi until 1956 when it was discovered that they’d plundered the company through the presentation of vast expenses. Aside from the castle, Lady Docker had lavishly created five show ‘Docker Daimler’ show cars covered in gold and upholstered with amongst other things zebra hide. When asked why she had done such, she coyly responded: “Because mink is too hot to sit on,” but subsequently after these and the castle had to be returned, the couple bought a Bentley Continental as revenge.

Now, today, Grade II listed Glandyfi (pronounced ‘Glandovey’) is for sale for what seems like a comparatively reasonable sum of £2.85 million, but it now comes minus the “glitzy” additions made by the Dockers. The Regency Gothic style stone and slate main building extends to 8,280 square feet over four floors and provides 5 reception rooms, 10 double bedrooms and 10 bathrooms and in addition comes with a courtyard with guest accommodation, a 1 bedroom lodge and a range of disused barns.

Externally, aside from a mature landscaped garden, the 31.43 acre plot includes a walled former kitchen garden, grazing land and woodland, but what is most impressive is the setting of what James Delingpole termed “not so much an austere, toff’s castle as a theme-park recreation of one” with “undoubtedly the most magnificent view from any house I know in Britain.”

Speaking to Anne Ashworth of The Times last time the allegedly haunted castle was placed for sale in July 2019, current selling agent Belinda Hutchinson-Smith of Strutt & Parker – whom also was involved in marketing the property to the current owners, the Holmes family, back in 2007 when she worked at Savills – stated:

“It was surreal [in 2007]. We were in a time warp. Almost nothing had changed since the Dockers moved out in the 1950s. There were 1950s newspapers strewn across the dining tables and in the bedrooms, books were left open on bedside tables. But, at the same time, the house had a magical feeling.”

In comments to the BBC in September 2014, when the former Docker one-of-one 1954 Daimler ‘Stardust’ was sold at auction for £110,000, Glandyfi’s current owner Maureen Holmes remarked:

“[Sir Bernard and Lady Docker] were clearly living the dream. From the red and white marble fireplaces to a path through the woods made entirely of upturned gin bottles, the castle oozed excess.”

“The older people around here who remember them say they were unbelievable, almost mythical figures. At a time when everyone else was still on rationing, the Dockers were thundering through the lanes in limousines made out of gold and silver.”

“The irony is, that whilst the locals felt the Dockers’ perceived wealth meant that they were utterly removed from the community, in actual fact they probably had no more money than anyone else in the area.”

Lady Docker pictured in one of the opulent ‘Docker Daimler’ show cars she commissioned her husband’s company to create; the most famous of the examples was known as the ‘Golden Zebra’ – this 1955 Daimler two-door coupé based on the DK400 chassis featured metal trim pieces plated in gold instead of chrome, an ivory dashboard and zebra-skin upholstery.

Thrice married Lady Docker (1906 – 1983), born Norah Turner and also variously Norah Callingham and Lady Collins, was born in Derby and began her career as a hostess at the Café de Paris in London. In Lancashire, her name is still used as a derogatory substitute for ‘Lady Muck’ and in spite of her once extravagant lifestyle, she died in poverty at the not so chi-chi Great Western Royal Hotel in Praed Street, Paddington, London.

In one of her last interviews, Lady Docker remarked: “I have always had the persistence to march on. I will continue to do that, until the day I die.” In spite of her reduced circumstances, she is said to have “retained a remarkable joie-de-vivre, downing glasses of pink champagne to the last.”

English poet Thomas Love Peacock got married at Glandyfi Castle in 1820; Chris Packham and Michaela Strachan stayed at the property whilst filming ‘Springwatch’ in 2012.

The Names & Numbers – Glandyfi Castle, Glandyfi, near Machynlleth, Ceredigion, Powys, Mid Wales, SY20 8SS, United Kingdom

October 2020 – Relaunched for sale for £2.85 million ($3.69 million, €3.15 million or درهم15.54 million) through Strutt & Parker.

June 2019 – Listed for sale for £2.85 million ($3.69 million, €3.15 million or درهم15.54 million) through Strutt & Parker with 31.43 acres of land.

2012 – Whilst filming the BBC’s Springwatch, presenters Chris Packham and Michaela Strachan stayed at the castle. Strachan wrote in the guest book: “I couldn’t imagine a nicer, more comfortable place to stay… I felt like a princess in my amazing room.” Packham added: “Staying at the castle has been a total treat. Hospitality, fine food, wonderful environment, views to die for and history.”

Late 2000s to September 2019 – Operated as an 8 bedroom “informal and relaxed [hotel and wedding venue] without any stuffiness or restrictions” by a theatre designer named Maureen Holmes and her family.

May 2007 – Offered for sale for £1.25 million ($1.62 million, €1.38 million or درهم5.94 million) through Savills with 43 acres of land on behalf of the late owner, one Mrs Betty Piper (1914 – 2006).

January 1964 – The building is given a Grade II listing, reference 9874, and is described as “the only example [of a] Georgian country house in picturesque castellated style in the county.”

1956 – Following discovery of the Dockers’ “profligacy” and their removal from BSA, the castle is sold.

1949 – Purchased by Birmingham Small Arms Company Limited for the use of Sir Bernard and Lady Docker for the sum of £12,000 or the equivalent of £427,000 ($552,000, €471,000 or درهم2 million) today. The company then lavished £25,000 or the equivalent of £890,000 ($1.2 million, €983,000 or درهم4.2 million) today on “opulent renovations of the home.”

1906 – Following the death of Charles Jeffreys, the castle and its lands pass out of the hands of that family after 114 years.

1820 – English poet Thomas Love Peacock (1785 – 1866) married Jane Griffith (also known as Jane Gryffydh) at the castle. His fellow poet and friend Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 – 1822) referenced Peacock’s wife “the milk-white Snowdonian Antelope.”

Early 19^th century – Built to the designs of an unknown architect for George Jeffreys, High Sheriff of Cardiganshire in 1819 on an estate acquired by his great uncle, Edward, in 1792.

Some of Lady Docker’s Notable Remarks

Of herself, as she moved to London to seek fame and fortune:

“An artificial blonde, among thousands of artificial blondes searching for stardom.”

Of her vision in life:

“[To] bring some happiness back to a world left hollow by the horror of two world wars… We bring glamour and happiness into drab lives. The working class loves everything I do.”

Of her father:

“A self-made man.”

Of her male “targets” and those she viewed to be husband material:

“Through my life, I set both my sights and my price high.”

Of her chairman of Fortnum & Mason second husband, Sir William Collins:

“He was 69, I married him for his money.”

Of her third husband, Sir Bernard Docker:

“I deliberately trapped him.”

When asked to justify why she covered the seats of a 1955 Daimler in zebra skin:

“Zebra, because mink is too hot to sit on.”

On the loss of the ‘Docker Daimlers’ when they were taken away from her and her husband:

“It’s not the loss of the gold cars that makes me feel like this… And weren’t they fun? They were like my children… No, it’s that lovely party I was planning for 25,000 of the company’s workers for my 50th birthday. A tiptop affair – and now it’s all off. How could they do this to [Sir Bernard] after 17 years? Why, he’s such a hard worker that he even had a direct line to the firm from our yacht.”

Of Prince Rainier of Monaco after her son was banned from his son’s christening and she decided to burn the Monacan flag:

“I’m at war with Rainier.”

To the captain of the liner the Queen Elizabeth:

“This ship is being run by a bloody Communist! Don’t you dare touch me, you bloody Communist!”

Of some miners she invited on her yacht:

“The dear boys, I just loved them! It proved conclusively to me that the social barrier only exists in the mind.”

Of a Monaco casino employee she had allegedly assaulted:

“It was a good sock I gave that man, and he deserved it.”

Of the people of Jersey:

“They are the most frightfully boring, dreadful people that have ever been born.”

PICTURED TOP: Glandyfi Castle and the estuary beyond; Sir Bernard and Lady Docker at the castle.

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October 5, 2020
Wally of the Week – Lady Green

BHS bandit Sir Philip Green’s wife’s bleating about being stuck on her yacht in Monaco is nothing but pathetic; Lady Green plainly has no comprehension of how out of touch she truly is with reality

The world said “diddums” for Sir Philip Green and his ludicrously wealthy, tax minimising wife Tina today with news that the couple cannot take their £100 million gin palace on a “family cruise” due to two staff onboard testing positive for coronavirus.

In an article titled: “Sir Shifty Cannot Be Shifted,” The Sun reported comments from Lady Green – whose grubby “Benny Hill-esque” husband ought to have been stripped of his title after having wrecked the British high street and treated his workforce so appalling – where she bleated about being stuck in Monaco and having a yellow flag of quarantine imposed on their vessel.

Lady Green plainly hasn’t learnt from her and her husband’s disastrous Prince Andrew-esque past forays into media relations. The public really couldn’t give two hoots for her situation; they’d rather the two of them did the decent thing and learnt the art of treating their employees and the British taxpayer properly.

Pictured top: A cartoon of Marie Antoinette-like Lady Green – a woman whose extravagance knows no bounds, but whose sympathy for ordinary folk could be summed up as: “Let them eat cake.”

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On Twitter, ‘Metro’ mocked Lady Green and her husband and stated: “Our thoughts are with anyone quarantining on a superyacht at this difficult time.”

Sir Philip Green and his wife have enjoyed a life of luxury with Bentleys and Louis Vuitton tennis racket covers whilst their workers have been forced into penury.

Previously another Twitter user, @RedFlagUK, pointed out that “greedy capitalist” Sir Philip “robbed people’s pensions to purchase himself a luxury yacht.”

In April, Led By Donkeys quite rightly reminded Sir Philip Green – whom was branded a cross between “Shylock and Al Capone” by the actor Steven Berkoff in The Steeple Times in September 2016 – of his contradictory behaviour alongside an image of him looking like a beached whale.

September 2, 2020
Rolls-Royce isn’t Rolls-Royce but it is Rolls-Royce

Rolls-Royce issues a press release to try and stop the media mistakenly saying they are Rolls-Royce; they want to highlight the difference between PLC and Cars

When you think of Rolls-Royce, you may think of handcrafted limousines made with the most exquisite materials. You might think of the royalty, heads of state and stars who’ve owned such vehicles, but one thing’s for sure, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, a “wholly-owned subsidiary of BMW Group (Munich)” now want to make very clear: They have nothing to do with the aircraft, ship and submarine manufacturers Rolls-Royce PLC.

In a press release issued on Thursday, Andrew Ball for Goodwood, West Sussex based Rolls-Royce Motor Cars pointedly remarked:

“Rolls-Royce Motor Cars has issued a statement in response to continuing media confusion and misreporting concerning its assumed or implied connection to Rolls-Royce PLC.”

“Media are kindly asked to note that images of Rolls-Royce motor cars, the black and silver ‘Double R’ logo, the ‘Spirit of Ecstasy’ (‘Flying Lady’) mascot, the Rolls-Royce Pantheon Grille and other related content are all signifiers of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars and its Brand.”

“The use of these images to illustrate stories relating to Rolls-Royce plc together with copy that unnecessarily confuses or conflates the two companies, is incorrect and leads to public confusion.”

Given “recent announcements” have led to the “media confusing and misreporting” the two, one thing’s for sure: A Rolls-Royce car is a Rolls-Royce car when it’s a Rolls-Royce Motor Car; when it’s not, it’s just not. “Now Jeeves, be a darling, go fetch the Toyota.”

Some quotes about Rolls-Royces

“Greatness takes time: It takes 13 hours to build a Toyota, but it takes 6 months to build a Rolls-Royce.”

Unknown.

“Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls-Royce to get advice from those who take the subway.”

‘Most successful investor in the world’ Warren Buffett.

“At 60 miles per hour, the loudest noise in this Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock.”

‘Father of Advertising’ David Ogilvy CBE.

“When you are a rich man, you are proud to own a Rolls-Royce and when you are a poor man, you are proud to own a Renault.”

Charismatic footballer Eric Cantona.

“If a working-class Englishman saw a bloke drive past in a Rolls-Royce, he’d say to himself: ‘Come the social revolution and we’ll take that away from you, mate.’ Whereas, if his American counterpart saw a bloke drive past in a Cadillac, he’d say: ‘One day, I’m going to own one of those.’ To my way of thinking, the first attitude is wrong. The latter is right.”

Media tycoon Kerry Packer.

Pictured top: A selection of models currently available in Rolls-Royce Motor Cars’ current line-up.

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Rolls-Royce Motor Cars want to remind the world that they produce motor cars. They most certainly don’t want people thinking they produce flying hairdryers.

In October 2016, ‘The Steeple Times’ featured this 1926 Rolls-Royce Phantom I by Brougham De Ville. It has an interior inspired by Versailles and the interior was described as “like stepping inside a very fine Georgian manor house.”

In March 2017, ‘The Steeple Times’ featured this 1958 Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud I drophead coupé. It was nicknamed ‘The Honeymoon Express’ given it seats just two and has an oversized boot capable of carrying a week’s luggage.

In August 2015, ‘The Steeple Times’ featured this 1973 Rolls-Royce Phantom VI by Pietro Frua. It was described as “the largest convertible ever built,” measured over 22-foot in length and took two years to build. The giant motor was originally owned by His Excellency Consul Simon van Kempen of Switzerland and Monaco sold for £442,546 including premium as part of The Frederiksen Auction in Denmark.

In February 2018, ‘The Steeple Times’ featured this special edition 1995 Rolls-Royce Flying Spur converted to an estate car from a Silver Spur III.

In September 2016, ‘The Steeple Times’ joined those describing the owner of this Rolls-Royce as having “the most vulgar numberplate in Britain.” The owner of ‘SH10W OF’ plainly is a person without an ounce of modesty in their entire being.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pndoAjymnMM

June 12, 2020
Bonded to a Short Lease

Eaton Square apartment in a Grade II* listed building that has been home to both Bond star Sir Roger Moore and aristocrat-who-went-missing Lord Lucan for sale for staggering sum given it is on a lease of just 15 years

Best known for playing the British secret agent James Bond in seven feature films from 1973 to 1985, Sir Roger Moore KBE (1927 – 2017) once remarked: “I enjoy being a highly paid actor.” He added: “It’s easy to sit in relative luxury and peace and pontificate on the subject of the Third World debts,” though in his various homes in such places as London, Monaco and Switzerland, he certainly illustrated that he took the bit about opulence seriously indeed.

Now, someone with aspirations to live like “the definitive Bond” has the opportunity to purchase an apartment in an Eaton Square building where not only he resided, but one that was also a childhood home of the most famous aristocrat to go missing ever, the 7^th Earl of Lucan (born 1934, last seen alive in 1974, declared dead in 2016).

John Bingham, better known as ‘Lucky’ or Lord Lucan, is said to have returned to London from wartime exile in New York in February 1945 with his siblings to find: “As they walked past their home at Cheyne Walk, they realised the whole building had been bombed. Their other family home at 22 Eaton Square had no windows due to the blow of a bomb and rationing was in full swing.”

The apartment available now has windows complete with actual glass in-situ and is situated in what was once a single-family residence. It extends to 927 square foot and consists of a reception room with open plan kitchen, two bedrooms, one bathroom and one shower room. There are wooden floors throughout and the space has air conditioning also.

The fourth floor flat at 22 Eaton Square is offered by estate agents Ayrton Wylie at a price of £795,000 ($1 million, €914,000 or درهم3.7 million) or the equivalent of £53,000 per year ($66,700, €60,900 or درهم244,800 per year). Its lease expires on the 23^rd February 2035 and an annual service charge of £6,779 per year ($8,526, €7,791 or درهم31,313 per year) is payable also.

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May 1, 2020