The Russian desecration of London

Now that his old arch-enemy, Boris Berezovsky, has bitten the dust, Roman Abramovich can devote his full attention to another bête noire — London’s terraced houses.

In his £10 million plan to knock together three houses, worth £100 million, in Chelsea’s Cheyne Walk, the oligarch is raising the roof, ripping out internal floors and walls, and burrowing two floors down into the courtyard. He is also ripping out two staircases. Russian expats may hanker after the steppes but they don’t like British stairs.

The cement mixers will whirr for three years in one of London’s loveliest streets. That won’t bother Abramovich and his girlfriend Dasha Zhukova; with his generous property portfolio and £10 billion fortune, I’m sure they’ll find somewhere warm to camp during the renovation. But his neighbours don’t have that option — and they’re up in arms, full of talk about what they call Abramovich’s hideous ‘fortress’ and the endless traffic problems the work will cause.