An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
As a born-and-bred Londoner, the thought of living elsewhere has always repulsed me. And yet now I feel an ever-increasing desire to run for the hills. Thankfully I’m not alone in feeling restless and dissatisfied. And while my reluctance to live a plane ride away from my parents is keeping me in the country (for now at
May Day is behind us, the summer season approaching, and already the tensions between second homeowners and locals in Cornish seaside towns have been gleefully reported by the tabloid press. Visit Cornwall is considering a register of second homes while councils are proposing a tax on empty properties. House prices have gone up by an average
Turville Grange has many of the expected hallmarks of the top-end English country houses and estates on the market this spring. First comes its punchy price tag – in this case £18.75m – and lusted after location, the upmarket riverside town of Henley-on-Thames, in Oxfordshire. Then there are its classic good looks: built in Queen
The biggest long-term threat to the Conservatives is neither partygate nor even the cost of living crisis – but declining rates of home ownership. As Mrs Thatcher understood, when people are able to afford their own home, they become more conservative in outlook. They put down roots in their local area and they gain a
Prime Central London has always been viewed as safe. It has some major plus points for the world’s wealthy – it’s on the Greenwich Meridian so can trade East and West, is an island considered geographically safe and geo-politically stable. Wherever you lived in the world you could stash a considerable portion of your wealth in
With its high society intrigue, gossipy plotlines, raunchy love scenes and gravity defying hair do’s, all set against the backdrop of spectacularly sumptuous homes, Netflix series Bridgerton has rewritten the rules for small-screen period drama. The Shonda Rhimes exec-produced series gained 193 million hours of viewing time for its second series in the first three days –
Nine years ago, when I invested every-thing I had in a part-rent, part-buy, one-bedroom, government-backed eco-home which proved to be a boiling box in summer, my first instinct was to throw myself out of a window – but I couldn’t because they opened only ten centimetres. My second was to complain about it in The
You’d be forgiven for thinking that buying land is just the same as buying a house. But, other than the form of contract and the stamp duty you pay, the two transactions have almost nothing in common. When you buy a house, even if it comes with land attached, what you’re really buying is a
A house around the corner is on its fourth kitchen in a decade. Every two or three years, the house changes hands, the pristine kitchen comes out and a newer, pristiner kitchen goes in. They are always white, they are always shiny, and when I peer through the basement windows there is nothing in the
The best recent advert for the bella vita is surely actor Stanley Tucci sampling regional cuisines in CNN’s Searching for Italy exclaiming ‘oh my god’ at least four times an episode as he swoons over risotto Milanese or Sicilian pasta alla Norma. It’s these sun-soaked visions of a foodie paradise that persuade scores of Northern Europeans
I’ve recently become betrothed, so naturally I’ve started playing the fantasy house game; scrolling through property sites on my phone, highest price first, before I go to sleep at night. I thought I knew what I was looking for; a Georgian townhouse, solid stone steps leading up to a grand front door, basement kitchen, you
Cornwall has a boast this week and it has nothing to do with ice-cream or tides: we have made more than 2000 offers to house Ukrainian refugees. I am not surprised. The duchy is filled with second homes, and they are very often empty. Harboursides are dark in winter and the old town in St
In recent years Portugal’s been pulling away from its image as a place for golf-playing retirees. Now it’s a fashionable and increasingly upmarket destination for home buyers who are drawn by its tax benefits coupled with its unspoilt coastlines and low-octane lifestyle. As of December 2021, there were 42,071 Britons resident in Portugal, according to
Is the property market stagnating? According to the latest figures from the Nationwide House Price Index you could be forgiven for thinking that everything’s tickety-boo. Prices are up 1.7 per cent and annual growth now running at 12.6 per cent with the typical home up to 20 per cent higher than in February 2020. However, with
As the spectre of nuclear war returns so does another very modern phenomenon: a spike in interest amongst the paranoid rich seeking to procure their own nuclear bunker. Over in Texas – already home to a vibrant culture of ‘preppers’ who spend their time planning for every shade of apocalypse – one creator of custom
Ever since the early 2000s, London’s luxury property market has been the preserve of foreign investors, many of whom are purported to be Russian. In Chelsea, Highgate and Hampstead, streets of empty mansions quickly became an inevitable part of city life, while the Russian investment phenomenon was dubbed ‘Londongrad’. Thanks to the use of myriad offshore companies and
Will the housing market crash? We have been asking the question for two decades now are prices climbed to ever higher multiples of earnings. But apart from a few months in 2008 and early 2009, when prices did slide appreciably, it never seems to happen. Stock market corrections come and go but nothing will seem
Offering a choice of three stunning coastlines, historic villages and dozens of wine-making regions France has long been one of our favourite places to buy a holiday home. Queen Victoria loved Nice, Noel Coward adored Cap Ferrat and the ‘old’ French Riviera between Toulon and Hyères features in the new Downtown Abbey film out next month,
That Essex County Council is spending £300,000 on an advertising campaign to rehabilitate its reputation can’t come as a surprise. The only surprise is that it didn’t think to do it before – or that somehow they believe £300,000 is enough to turn the tide. As far as I can tell, £300,000 won’t touch the sides.
Being Henry VIII’s confessor must have been a nerve-racking job, but it’s one John Longland – who also held the titles Dean of Salisbury and Bishop of Lincoln, and was thus a major ecclesiastical figure of the Tudor era – held with aplomb. Although he was closely associated with influential men (and bigger names) such
Hands up if you’ve ever had your house decorated and strategically placed a couple of empty tins of Farrow & Ball Dead Salmon on the doorstep so the neighbours appreciate your excellent taste. It happens a lot, says Henry Prideaux, a London-based interior designer who agrees that a certain kind of paint brand, ‘can appeal
Back in the day, saving for your first home used to be a bit of a doddle. Find a nice savings account paying 5 or 6 per cent, stick away as much as you can every month, and, within a few years, head for the estate agents. Talk of a ten-year slog to get on
Wiltshire’s property prices have been given a shot in the arm during the pandemic. It’s one of those desirable rural locations that has suddenly became even more popular as we have veered from daily commuting towards flexible working. Historic towns such as Salisbury, Marlborough and Warminster have been perennial favourites but are attracting buyers looking
They could cancel their Netflix subscriptions, stop drinking chai tea or go a little easier on the avocados and the smoothies. And perhaps most of all they could get on their bikes and start searching for some cheaper places to live. Kirstie Allsopp, the presenter of popular TV shows such as Location, Location, Location, probably always
All the best houses can be found on Rightmove, right? Well, actually no. Increasing numbers of properties are being sold ‘off-market’ in an environment where there’s very little supply and a range of motivated buyers. How can you access these properties if you’re looking to move and how can you avoid getting stung? There are some interesting
The preponderance of publicity over the last 24 months exhorting Londoners to abandon ship has left some areas of the capital looking like relative bargains or at least lagging behind widely hyped price rises elsewhere in the UK. Indeed, the average property price in Cambridge is now higher than that of the capital. Anecdotally, the
Bracing sea air, walks along windswept dunes and early-morning dips in the surf …living by the seaside can be just the tonic for mind, body and soul. What’s more, with greater opportunities for remote working, it’s in vogue. According to the agent Knight Frank, the sale of coastal homes increased 19 per cent over the
Life in the world’s newest republic is sweet. It’s peak season in Barbados, and another wave of Covid hasn’t stopped the rum sundowners flowing on the Caribbean island’s sugar-sand beaches. Given half the chance, many of us might well prefer to spend January wafting between beachfront restaurants and sun loungers, as the packed front-end of planes heading
It takes a lot to put the British off buying a bolthole on the Continent. Not even the twin headwinds of the pandemic and Brexit have deterred some determined sun-seeking buyers over the past year, for whom endless chilly staycations don’t cut the mustard. There is no doubt some people who had planned to buy
