Living with the stars

Published 10th Sep 2007

Having a celebrity on your street might raise house prices, but it can also bring its fair share of problems, says Catherine Moye

An A-list celebrity moving in down the street used to bring a frisson of excitement and cachet to a neighbourhood. Not any more. For those living closest to the home of an icon, the prospect of being inflicted with the public circus the word "celebrity'' now implies, meets with the unanimous cry of "over my dead body''.

When word leaked out this July that Kate Moss had put in a £6.5 million offer on a six-bedroom house on Blomfield Road in Maida Vale, the supermodel was about as welcome with the locals as a bag lady at a duchess's tea party. In the same week, the German supermodel Heidi Klum chose America's Jay Leno Show to let off steam about the demise of her previously peaceful street since David and Victoria Beckham moved in. "There is a paparazzi festival down the street from us now," Klum complained. "You just don't know what that means. You couldn't even drive by the [Beckhams'] house because the paparazzi were hanging out, waiting for them to leave. You couldn't even pass on the street." In nearby Hollywood Hills, the media siege near Paris Hilton's house during her short stint in jail forced some beleaguered residents to flee their homes.

The grievances of someone like Klum, who chooses to live in Celebrity Central, can be said to be part of the same machine she complains about. However, there are those who, despite being members of the truly super-rich class, deserve sympathy.

In Britain, especially, the very wealthy choose to live in prime areas of central London as inconspicuously as a spy in deep cover. Yet A-list celebrities desperate for privacy seek out the same kinds of properties as these discreet souls: secure, secluded, with off-street parking. Such houses are rare, so this puts the famous cheek by jowl with the acutely publicity-shy.

"I could count on the fingers of both hands the number of houses where you get total privacy in your own enclave," says Ed Mead, director of estate agency Douglas & Gordon. "Like most of us, the super-rich want to live next to someone who is a model citizen and I would say that the very definition of a celebrity is about as far away from 'model citizen' as you can get."

Celebrities' lives can be irregular. They come and go in an unsettling fashion for neighbours, accompanied by a veritable tornado of hangers-on and paparazzi documenting everything from shopping trips to spats with boyfriends. Indeed, in the high-end property world the merest hint of celebrity endorsement can be the kiss of death to a scheme. "Posh Spice went to view a house in a high-end development in Kensington and we had to do everything in our power to keep it out of the press," says Jamie Jago, of leading property PR firm Jago Dean. "It would have been a disaster if it had got out that she had looked around.

"At the low and middle end, celebrity interest in a development is a good thing, but at the high end the reverse is the case," she continues. "People are moneyed but in a very different way. Discretion is key, and potential buyers want to be reassured that they are going to be surrounded by people as discreet as themselves: those who don't want to be talked about or attract attention. Posh Spice hardly falls into that category."

It is not just paparazzi climbing trees or their scooters and flashbulbs keeping you awake at all hours that can lower the tone of discerning neighbourhoods. Some celebrities can provoke hostility all by themselves. Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood recently soundproofed his £12 million Surrey mansion following complaints from neighbours about the noise from his studio and entertainment room, in which he often holds late-night parties.

Perhaps Ronnie Wood's neighbours should count themselves lucky. In April, the artist Damien Hirst applied for permission to add an "abattoir rail" and "fish preparation area" to the gallery-cum-workshop he is building in Stroud, Gloucestershire. Two years ago, trading standards officers investigated the discovery of a cow's head and other rotting remains outside another Hirst studio in the Gloucestershire village of Chalford.

This summer, neighbours of Jane Seymour's Cotswolds manor house have complained about loud parties being held by people renting the property. The gatherings at St Catherine's Court, near Bath, they say, are shattering the "peace and tranquillity".

Rumours that Kate Moss intended to convert a garden cottage at the Blomfield Road property into a studio for her then boyfriend, Pete Doherty, doubtless added to the scrum of neighbours begging the vendors to sell to anyone but her. They later accepted another offer.

"I heard about the hostility in the immediate area to Kate Moss buying that house and I think it's fair comment that the vendor would be influenced by those living around them," says James Simpson, partner of Knight Frank's St John's Wood office, who sold the house.

This was not an isolated case. "Recently, we sold another house where we had a higher offer from a major celebrity that the vendor turned down because of the resistance from longstanding friends and neighbours to the celebrity moving into the area," says Mr Simpson. "When you're talking about houses worth millions of pounds people already have a lot of money and are prepared to take a lower offer to please people with whom they have long standing associations."
In the current market, with a shortage of high-end properties, vendors can afford to be choosy. The Blomfield Road house sold for £12 million, more than twice the asking price.

Occasionally, of course, a celebrity moving into an area can bring up the whole place. Marylebone was scarcely on the radar until Madonna and her husband, Guy Ritchie, bought an eight-bedroom, Georgian terraced house there five years ago.

"At the time it really put the area on the map," says Paul Sulkin of local estate agents Kay & Co. "There was a lot of press which shone a spotlight on Marylebone and people looking to live here still mention the fact that Madonna has a house in the area." Indeed, she has several. In June of this year, the Queen of Pop bought the £6 million house next door to her existing Great Cumberland Place home, and she also owns two nearby mews cottages that house her staff.

Madonna's property portfolio includes the 1,200-acre Ashcombe estate near the village of Tollard Royal, in Wiltshire, although, arguably, Ashcombe's former owner, society photographer Cecil Beaton, put Tollard Royal on the map first.

Then there is the "Padstein" phenomenon, when a local boy makes good. Rick Stein moved to Padstow in 1965, and opened a seafood restaurant shortly after. Several decades on, as multi-millionaire celebrity chef, he has expanded his business to include a cafe, delicatessen, gift shop, hotels and cookery school, turning a once quiet enclave into a tourist haven. It hasn't been to everyone's taste: Stein argues that his fame has benefited other businesses, while some argue that his building work has lost them trade and detracted from Padstow's charm.

There are benefits to having a celebrity neighbour. When Annmarie McDonald moved to London from Washington DC to open a fashion store, Crimson, she found its location a little lacking in foot traffic. Connaught Village was both prime central and a quiet backwater. Enter the Blairs this spring - the area is suddenly on the map and business is booming.

"Before the Blairs' move here there was a lot of complaining, and even after they arrived people resented the heavy police presence," says Ms McDonald. "But there's a new energy around since they arrived. The fact that everyone discussed their arrival brought people on to the streets talking to one another. Neighbours that had never met got to know one another, which has to be a good thing."

Charles Oliver, associate director of Chesterton's Hyde Park office, agrees. "Tony Blair moving here has drawn attention to the fact that this is a residential area and very conveniently situated," he says.

However, Ms McDonald concedes that three months after they moved in, two out of three people are still complaining about the "Blair effect" on Connaught Square. "Parking Bays have been blocked off and I suppose there is something a bit off-putting about seeing anti-terrorist police with huge guns standing around on street corners," she says.

"Coming to the UK from Washington DC, I suppose I'm used to that kind of thing, but if you're elderly and have lived in the area for decades, it's disconcerting."

Mr Oliver points out that the opposite is also true: "A lot of clients are impressed to see police patrolling the streets and not sitting at desks doing paperwork."

And perhaps they are also a little nervous. Model citizens the Blairs may be. But they may well attract less savoury types.

Homes that will land you next door to celebrities
Ilfracombe, Devon
£495,000
This five-bedroom house with retail shop on the quay, a few doors from Damien Hirst's restaurant.
Hammersmith Grove, W6
£2.1M
Comedian Bill Bailey and actor Ralph Fiennes live on the same street as this six-bedroom Victorian house with garden.
Brighton, Sussex
£2.5M
Nick Berry and Fat Boy Slim are neighbours of this Western Esplanade four-bedroom home, which has sun terraces and access to a private beach.

Source: ' Telegraph '

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