Jul 08

Property billionaire Christian Candy’s battle over £200m London home’s garden

Christian Candy, the billionaire property developer behind One Hyde Park, is at loggerheads with its neighbours over his plans to build a garden outside his £200m Regent’s Park home.

Neighbours have complained to Camden Council about the proposals for the list building saying they are “offensive” and a “misrepresentation of history”.

Critics of the proposals take issue to Candy’s claims of “reinstating a historic garden” designed by renowned architect John Nash.

Sir Colin Blakemore, the Emeritus Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Oxford, and Candy’s neighbour said: “Two detailed early illustrations of Cambridge Terrace and Chester Gate clearly confirm that there was no historic garden.

“John Nash did not design a garden, and no garden was created during the building of Cambridge and Chester Terraces, nor at any time during Nash’s lifetime.

“The garden (smaller than the currently proposed development) that existed briefly between the 1860s and the 1880s was not designed by Nash and it was soon removed, perhaps to facilitate the flow of vehicles through Chester Gate (even before the introduction of motor cars).

“To construct a larger private garden would not conserve a design by John Nash, and would reduce Chester Gate to a width less than was considered appropriate for the public even in the second half of the nineteenth century.”

A spokesman for Candy said: “Residents have suggested the garden was never there. We respectfully disagree. There is ample evidence to show the garden was built shortly after the construction of Cambridge Terrace.

“Concerns regarding any proposal which changes the status quo in the Regent’s Park area are natural. This is a special area that should be conserved and protected.”