Sun shines on winners
The world’s best holiday homes from more than 26 countries competed for awards at last week’s Daily Mail sponsored gala evening in London. Nigel Lewis reports.
THE international property Oscars took place at a celebrity gala evening last week in London. This year, the prestigious event was sponsored by the Daily Mail, which is proud to help highlight the best foreign homes on the market.
More than 500 guests, including former BBC royal correspondent Jennie Bond and rock star Rick Wakeman, attended the event.
There were 128 awards, including gongs for the best estate agents, developers, architecture and interior design by country and development.
The 15- strong judging panel included Peter Bolton King, chief executive of the National Association of Estate Agents, Eric Pickles, shadow Secretary of State for Local Government, James Lawton, chief designer at Laura Ashley, and Paul Stringer of the Jack Nicklaus Design Centre. Many of the winning developments and agents will be familiar names to Daily Mail readers. These include Humber Valley and Mont Tremblant in Canada, Borgo di Colleoli in Tuscany, and The Landings in St Lucia.
Pezula in South Africa, Kamares in Cyprus, Regal Palms in Florida and Praia D’el Rey and Parque de Floresta in Portugal also came out on top. Many of these have been featured on the pages of Property Mail but that was no guarantee of success. The judges were looking for the best construction quality, design inside and out and, in the case of estate agents, top- of-the-range service.
The judging categories included the best golf, marina and sports developments as well as country-bycountry awards for British favourites including Florida, Spain, Turkey, Portugal, France, Greece, South Africa, Italy, the Caribbean, Malta and Cyprus.
And to reflect the broadening tastes of property buyers, more far- flung and unusual countries were represented, too, including Japan, Thailand, Switzerland, Fiji, Costa Rica, New Zealand, Australia and even China. ■ FOR a full list of the competition winners, visit www.propertyawards.net