Sweet victory as mogul wins bid to expand ‘Candyland’
HE REPUTEDLY spent much of lockdown in the Bahamas after declaring that he was ‘sick of Britain’, while opting to headquarter his business operations in Guernsey. But does billionaire property man Christian Candy in fact hanker for the Home County comforts of Surrey, where he and his older brother, Nick, grew up?
I ask because, after a year-long battle, he has just secured permission for what might be termed the mother of all extensions at Cheval Manor, the residence he snapped up for £29 million in 2015.
Covering more than 4,500 sq ft, and of neo-classical design, the single-storey addition amounts to four times the estimated average floor space enjoyed by houses in England and Wales — and ten times that of the average flat.
The immense area will be divided into just two rooms, according to documents lodged with the local council: a dining hall with ‘views over the landscaped garden’, and a lounge ‘sited directly against Cheval Manor’.
Since acquiring the manor, Candy, 47, has spent at least £50 million buying six adjoining plots of land and six houses in what has become known by neighbours as ‘Candyland’.
Spurred on by the vision and ambition which saw him sell a single Knightsbridge apartment for £100 million — just 12 years after he and Nick acquired a ropey one-bedroom London flat for £122,000 — he has already secured permission to gouge out two tunnels.
One, 65ft long, will connect the mansion and a ‘super-basement’ with an underground car museum for 57 vehicles; the second, 200ft long, will link the museum with a cinema, kitchen, dance studio, spa, swimming pool and nymphaeum.
The latter — an early form of grotto — was much favoured in Ancient Greece and Rome, and dedicated, as the name suggests, to nymphs. Something of a novelty to have one within a couple of miles of the Egham bypass.