Shock as son says Earl of Bradford ‘is out to lunch’
ANEW year is routinely seen as a moment for optimism — an opportunity for a fresh start. But I fear it hasn’t quite worked out as intended for Alexander Bridgeman, Viscount Newport, thanks to an interview in February’s Tatler.
After reflecting on an eventful 2022 — he married Latvian-born Eliza Liepina last May in a sumptuous, three-day wedding, described by the society magazine as ‘a riot of dinners’ and ‘copious margaritas’ — Newport, 42, turns to how he runs the 12,000-acre family estate very differently from his father, the Earl of Bradford.
The Earl, 75, ‘didn’t appear to show the same eagerness to get his boots dirty’, reports Tatler, preferring to draft in consultants — not always ‘to the ultimate benefit of the land’ — while concentrating on running his London restaurant, Porters in Covent Garden.
The Earl’s professional life is over — according to his eldest son. ‘He’s retired now,’ Newport says. ‘He likes to go out to lunch . . .’ The brutal summary stuns Shropshire locals.
‘It’s shocking — very sad,’ one familiar with the estate tells me. It is also inaccurate — if inadvertently so. Mindful of the family motto — Nec temere, nec timide (‘Neither rashly nor timidly’) — Richard Bradford, as the Earl prefers to be known, is disappointed but diplomatic.
‘I have a degree in agriculture, I seldom go out to lunch and I’m definitely not retired,’ Bradford, who has suffered two expensive divorces, tells me. ‘[Alexander] knows I’m not retired, so I have no idea how [that got in]. I didn’t know he was being interviewed.’
He adds: ‘I’m in Ghana, where I taught chemistry for VSO [Voluntary Service Overseas]. One of my former pupils and I have bought 50 acres. We are growing mangos and avocados.’
Might be a struggle to emulate that in Shropshire — even for his ambitious, outspoken son.