Homes gossip

Pop idol Robbie Williams is on the brink of selling Compton Bassett House, the 18th-century Wiltshire mansion he bought “on impulse” 12 months ago for £8.5 million.

“He’s spent a fortune doing it up, including building a racing track for his rage buggies,” scoffs a neighbour. “But he’s hardly ever here and has never become part of the community. “Anyway, how would a boy from Stoke-on-Trent understand the country?”

The recovering drug addict and alcoholic appears to be homesick for the sunshine and privacy of Los Angeles where he and his girlfriend, Turkish-American actress Ayda Field, share an £8 million mansion.

Meanwhile, Formula One champion Jenson Button is said to have offered £6 million for the seven-bedroom pile in 70 acres near Chippenham. “Williams could probably get £7 million,” says a local estate agent.

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On top of the embarrassment of giving evidence to the Iraq inquiry Sir Christopher Meyer, our former ambassador to Washington, has suffered a major property blow. Last summer he put his four-bedroom Victorian terrace house in Knightsbridge on the market at £2.95 million. Last month, on the day of exchange of contracts at the reduced price of £2.72 million, the offer fell through.

The ex-Press Complaints Commission chairman was the first to recognise that the property he and his wife Catherine bought for £1.885 million in 2007 has one drawback: the District line runs underneath. “I’d rather hear a Tube train than the planes flying over south-west London. Ghastly,” says Sir Christopher.

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Actress Sharon Small, who plays sultry Trudi in BBC1 drama series Mistresses, has moved to that increasingly luvvie-perfumed north London suburb Muswell Hill. Her new property, close to Albert Road Recreation Ground, provides extra space needed for her young sons Leo and Zac and her partner, Dan Bridge.

“Several neighbours called to introduce themselves on our first day here and even sent cards and invited us to a party,” says Fife-raised Small. “It’s the first time since moving to London that I’ve felt part of a community.” Famous locals include comics Johnny Vegas and Michael McIntyre and opera singers Katherine Jenkins and Lesley Garrett.

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Tenor Alfie Boe has begun house-hunting within range of the Royal Opera House and London Coliseum. “We have a house in Utah but we’re looking for a home in London,” he says. The Lancashire-born former paint-sprayer already shares a home near Oxford with his American actress wife Sarah Jones and their baby, Grace.

The youngest of nine children of Irish Catholic parents, he left Fleetwood aged 19 to join the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company. “I spent a lot of time in London sleeping at other people’s houses and on a Hyde Park bench,” recalls best-selling Boe. “I was determined not to be forced to go back home.”